“One whiff of corruption and you’re out!” is a warning often heard from President Rodrigo Duterte addressed to his appointees in the Executive Department. He boasts of having removed a number of high ranking officials and indeed, he has. However, some of them have just been transferred to other positions after being asked to resign which brings people to doubt the President’s sincerity in ridding his administration of corruption.
Tourism Secretary Wanda Tulfo Teo is in the middle of a controversy involving a P60-million DoT advertising contract with People’s Television Network Inc., more popularly known as PTV4 and awarded to Bitag Media Unlimited Inc., owned by Secretary Teo’s brother Ben Tulfo. BMUI runs the program “Kilos Pronto” daily hosted by the Tulfo brothers.
The controversy surfaced when the Commission on Audit, in its audit report of PTV4, questioned the validity of the payments made because of the absence of a Memorandum of Agreement between PTV4 and Tulfo’s BMUI. CoA has since required the submission of documents that will prove the legality and validity of this particular transaction between DoT, PTNI, and BMUI. Initially, Teo said she did not have any knowledge of this deal. Eventually, however, she changed her statement and said that she came to know of the deal only after the contract had already been signed.
As expected, this issue exploded especially since the DoT has already been criticized because of the absence of a comprehensive tourism plan for the country. Some weeks back, the Tourism Secretary was also criticized because of the cancelation of two important international events, the Madrid Fusion and the Street Food Expo. The first was canceled allegedly because Teo wanted to change the venue to one of her favorite places, as well as the event organizer from one that has been used by the Madrid Fusion in previous years to another that the secretary uses. The organizers, understandably, did not agree to these, and the event was canceled.
Some quarters were already questioning the DoT’s motives for insisting on the changes.
And then here comes this P60-million controversy. It does not need a genius to determine that something is wrong, that at the very least, there is clear conflict of interest in what the DoT did whether or not the Secretary knows or not. However, it is highly doubtful that the head of the department would not know of a transaction of this magnitude that his/her office is a party to. If this is the case, his/her capacity to lead the agency comes into question.
If indeed Teo only got to know of the deal after the fact, she still would have known that the contract can easily be questioned and she would be liable. As head of the department, she still should have taken steps to stop, or, at the very least insisted on NOT having his siblings’ company/program as recipient of the money. She did not—and so she should be taken to task.
The choice of PTV4 to air advertisements meant to attract tourists to the country is also being questioned because it is common knowledge that the station’s audience share leaves much to be desired. “Why PTV4? Who watches PTV4?” are common questions among netizens. Teo’s legal counsel said on television that the Tulfo brothers’ show was chosen because of its high ratings. This was belied by netizens who posted Nielsen ratings of some public affairs shows and none among PTV4’s shows was even mentioned. They said that the ratings were so low that Nielsen did not bother to publish.
Obviously, spending P60 million on the weakest TV station to promote tourism is a bad decision. Potential local tourists do not watch this channel and it is unrealistic to expect foreigners to be enticed to visit the country through programs they do not watch. Teo is a business person. Surely, she would not invest her own money on a losing proposition. What the DOT did was worse because it is the people’s money they wasted—some say, corrupted.
The contract price was also scrutinized. It turned out that for 2017, the DOT spent the following for advertisement placement: for ABS-CBN and GMA, P11.5 million each; CNN Philippines–P20 million; CNN–P51 million; Discovery–P51 million; and BBC–P51 million. The top grosser was PTV4 for the amount of P60 million.
GMA and ABS-CBN, the homes of local TV shows that dominate the ratings game, only received less than half (P23 million combined) of what PTV4 received from DoT for ad placements in 2017. Also quite interesting is the fact that PTV4 also received more DoT business than international networks CNN, Discovery, and BBC. Sobra-sobra ang bilib ng DoT sa PTV4. At lalong sobra ang bilib ng DoT sa TV show ng mga kapatid ng Secretary sa PTV4.
It appears that Teo likes to have her family at her side as she does her job as a public servant. It has been reported that the Tourism Infrastructure and Enterprise Zone Authority, an agency under the DoT and also headed by the Secretary, also has as Director, the Secretary’s husband, Roberto Teo. Director Teo is part of all TIEZA committees namely Audit, of which he is chairperson; Infrastructure, Finance, Human Resource, Tourism Enterprise Zone, and Governance Committees.
The conflict of interest continues. No wonder, people are calling for Secretary Tulfo-Teo’s resignation. President Duterte’s “one whiff of corruption and you’re out” line should be applied here if Teo does not resign. However, what we have so far is Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque’s statement that the President will let go of his appointees if they are proven to be corrupt. This is not the same as what Duterte said.
Public office is a public trust. How can the Filipino public trust this Tourism Secretary who wastes people’s money, operates the department like a family business without any regard for decency and accountability?
With all these, it appears that Teo only has two options, resign or get fired.
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