Robredo will continue face-to-face campaign unless IATF protocols disallow it
Vice Presidet Leni Robredo waves to her supporters during her campaign sortie in Batangas. Image from Facebook / VP Leni Robredo
MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Leni Robredo would continue doing face-to-face campaign sorties for the 2022 national elections as long as the national government’s COVID-19 protocols allows it, his spokesperson said on Friday.
Lawyer Barry Gutierrez in an interview with ABS-CBN News Channel’s Headstart said that Robredo’s team intends to do face-to-face campaigning as it has been the strength of the Vice President even in the past elections — talking to people who may not back her presidential candidacy and then converting them as supporters.
Currently, the Commission on Elections (Comelec) allows physical campaigning, while observing the protocols and guidelines set by the Inter-Agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases (IATF).
“That’s really been her strength even in the previous elections. In fact, one point of pride for everybody in the campaign is that, put a group of people in the same room as Leni Robredo, and they will come away supporting her, believing in her,” Gutierrez said.
“We have that much trust and faith in her capacity to actually come across as a really genuine person who you would want to actually support as a candidate, and you know, as someone who should be President. So COVID protocols willing and IATF regulations allowing, we would want, as much as possible, to have all these physical sorties, face to face campaigning,” he added.
But if the IATF is compelled to tighten restrictions, possibly due to a sharp rise in COVID-19 infections in certain areas, Gutierrez said the Vice President would resort to online meeting or Zoom town halls.
“But in the absence of that or if restrictions become more stringent we have fallback plans in the form of online meetings, you know these Zoom town halls, and so on,” he explained.
“Because really unlike other camps which seem determined to keep their candidate out of the limelight as much as possible and to rely only on these curated materials on social media and traditional media, we believe that the more people who actually interact with the Vice President, the more people will actually come out to support her,” he added.
Robredo started out her campaign sortie in her hometown of Camarines Sur, before visiting some towns in Camarines Norte, Albay, and Sorsogon. While they employed a system where candidates would be atop a float as they speak to the people — as a precautionary measure against COVID-19 — such events still attracted huge crowds.
Recently, the Department of Health (DOH) expressed concern that the campaign kickoff last February 8 may lead to super-spreader events, as some health and safety protocols against the pandemic have been disregarded.
But Malacañang on Tuesday expressed confidence that the recent campaigns would not lead to more COVID-19 cases, especially as the surge brought by the Omicron variant is now on a downward trend.
Early in January, the country saw a huge and quick spike in COVID-19 infections due to the loosened restrictions during the holiday season, and the more infectious Omicron variant. At one point, active infections soared to over 291,000 — an all-time high for the Philippines.
