Harry drags Leni daughters into ‘Nasaan’ fray

Malacañang has taken umbrage at a tweet exchange of Vice President Leni Robredo’s daughters, citing it as among the reasons for President Rodrigo Duterte’s tirades against her after she helped out in typhoon relief efforts.

Presidential spokesperson Harry Roque insisted that the President’s rants against Robredo had basis and that the Palace saw no reason for the President to apologize to her.

Roque mentioned the Vice President’s tweets and those of her daughters, even though none of these posts mentioned Mr. Duterte.

Robredo on Wednesday called out President Duterte for falsely claiming that she made it appear that he was missing in action at the height of Typhoon “Ulysses” (international name: Vamco), which caused massive destruction in Luzon.

Roque said Mr. Duterte did nothing wrong and would not apologize, unlike Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo and Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana whom he described as “true gentlemen” for saying sorry to Robredo after they erroneously claimed that she boarded a Philippine Air Force C-130 plane for her relief efforts.

“The President did not say anything wrong,” Roque said at a press briefing.

#NasaanAngPangulo

He said the context for Mr. Duterte’s tirade was the trending hashtag #NasaanAngPangulo. He did not know if Robredo herself used the tag, he said, but he claimed that her tweets on providing updates on her initiative to help the typhoon survivors made it appear that she was in charge of relief efforts.

Mr. Duterte’s point was that government assets deployed for relief efforts had been prepositioned during the typhoon, he said.

People close to Robredo insinuated that the President was nowhere to be found, Roque said. “It did not help that even if I don’t know if the Vice President asked where is the President, the people close to her said it,” he said.

Roque cited the Nov. 14 tweet exchange of Robredo’s daughters, in which Tricia Robredo asked if somebody was still asleep when it was already 8 a.m., and Aika Robredo replied that it was a Saturday and a weekend.

None of the tweets mentioned a name or used the #NasaanAngPangulo tag.

Roque did not elaborate on why he felt this alluded to the President.

VP’s spokesperson

He said the statements of Robredo’s spokesperson, Barry Gutierrez, was another factor for the President’s statements against her.

Roque quoted Gutierrez as saying that leaders should be seen and felt in times of crisis, which he took to mean as a comment on the government’s response to Ulysses.

Gutierrez had also said it was important to make people feel that the government has not forgotten you, Roque noted.

“If it’s true, Vice President, that you did not ask where is the President, your spokesperson did. Scold your spokesperson. Do not demand an apology from the President,” he said.

In a tweet, Gutierrez condemned Roque for targeting Robredo’s daughters in the Palace briefing.

“Good lord, 69 Filipinos killed, 325,000 displaced, over P1.5 billion in damage, and this administration is now spending its time analyzing tweets from Leni’s daughters?” Gutierrez said.

Online harassment

“VP Leni immediately went back to work (on Monday). It’s been three days and they’re still hyperfixating on this issue. Tell me who’s politicking now?” he added.

Several netizens also pointed out that Robredo’s daughters—both of whom were not public officials—should not have been subjected to scrutiny in an official Palace briefing. Both have been the targets of online harassment by anti-Robredo supporters.

“Firstly, I don’t understand the fixation here. It’s a hashtag, it trended, get over it. Hello, 91 percent?” Gutierrez said.

The Vice President’s spokesperson said he had never posted anything like that on his social media accounts before chiding the administration for “having so much time [for useless things] on their hands.”

Roque justified Mr. Duterte’s threats against Robredo after he was asked if such behavior was presidential.

He said Mr. Duterte was not “plastic,” and this was not the first time he acted this way. The people seem to accept him for who he is, he added.

91% trust rating

“The President’s behavior has been consistent. Is that unpresidential? I don’t think so because 91 percent of the people have said that they trust and they believe that the President is performing well in his duties. Is it unpresidential? According to 91 percent of our people, no; according to 5 percent, including the Vice President, yes,” Roque said.

In an interview, Gutierrez asked the administration why it was so insecure about Robredo’s typhoon recovery efforts “when they had a 91-percent approval rating.”

“Instead of talking about what needs to be done in order to rebuild the lives of all those affected by the typhoon, [here] we are spending so much time talking about hashtags, talking about who said what,” he said. “To be very clear, we are not interested in this.”

Gutierrez said it made no sense for the President to be so offended by a trending topic that did not even come from the Vice President’s camp when Robredo has been “continuously blasted by never-ending barrage of fake news, online abuse and her daughters subjected to rape threats.”

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