The Marikina local government unit said it would file a case against a drone operator for displaying an inverted Philippine flag – which signals that the country is in a state of war – during the closing ceremonies of the 63rd Palarong Pambansa Saturday evening.
“The Marikina city government, led by Mayor Marcy Teodoro, strongly condemns the incident and intends to hold Drone Tech PH responsible as well as to determine the company’s legal responsibilities, including the accompanying penalties,” the LGU said in a statement.
The operator, Drone Tech PH, has apologized for the incident through a statement on its Facebook page.
“We would like to apologize to the City of Marikina, Mayor Marcelino Marcy Teodoro, and to the whole country, its people and the Philippine government for a grave error we have made in the drone show programming of the colors red and blue of our Philippine flag which were interchanged,” Drone Tech said.
The company claimed the drone show was supposed to be tested days before the actual performance, but they were unable to do so because of the recent typhoons.
“We have innocently made this mistake and have no malice or bad intentions on anyone and the people of Marikina and the Philippines as a whole,” the company added.
The Philippine flag, if flown from a flagpole, shall have its blue field on top in time of peace and the red field on top in time of war. If in a hanging position, the blue field shall be to the left (observer’s point of view) in time of peace, and the red field to the left (observer’s point of view) in time of war.