Zubiri to DOT: do more than just correcting controversial promo video

MALAYBALAY CITY (MindaNews / 6 July)—Repairing the harm done to the country as “a rising global tourism power” by the “misleading inclusion” of stock footage in the “Love the Philippines” campaign video of the Department of Tourism (DOT) should go beyond producing a correct version of the controversial promotional video, Senate President Juan Miguel F. Zubiri said.

_{A screengrab from the Department of Tourism’s new promotional video. It was later taken down by the DOT when netizens noted that stock footages taken from other countries were included in the video.}

Zubiri’s statement came in the wake of criticisms that followed the discovery that the DOT’s video used footage taken in other countries.

The fiasco didn’t escape the eyes of some foreign news outlets.

Zubiri said that while the DOT was criticized for the misleading inclusion of stock footage in the “Love the Philippines” campaign video, “let us also allow the Department to correct this misstep, reflect on what happened, and improve its campaign going forward.”

“The concerned ad agency has already owned up to its negligence and the DOT has already gone on record rightly taking responsibility for the controversy, and terminating the contract with the agency,” he noted.

“I believe that Secretary [Christina Garcia] Frasco and the Department had no ill intent in this mishap, but I nevertheless expect them to take this incident very seriously, and hold accountable those who have wronged the Filipino people and the tourist spots that were replaced with alien places,” he said.

He added the DOT leadership’s call to stick with their new campaign slogan is duly noted, “but this should not be the end-all of the corrective process.”

Zubiri urged agencies such as the Department of Public Works and Highways, the Department of Transportation, and the Department of Health to work closely with the DOT to improve the country’s tourism infrastructures to bring in billions of dollars in tourism revenues.

“…We should refrain from damaging further our image as a rising global tourist destination,” he concluded.

In the past few days, netizens had posted images of popular tourism destinations in foreign countries and embedded in them the “Love the Philippines” logo in an apparent attempt to parody the misrepresentation in the controversial video.

Among these images were the pyramids of Egypt labeled as the Chocolate Hills of Bohol, the Roman Colosseum identified as the Araneta Coliseum, the Arc de Triomphe tagged as the Elliptical Road in Quezon City, and the Ruins of Parthenon as the Central Post Office in Manila, a Greek-inspired building that burned early this year. (MindaNews)

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