Vice-President Leni Robredo. INQUIRER FILE PHOTO / RICHARD A. REYES
Vice President Leni Robredo has no time to waste on “trolls” and her detractors on social media.
“I have no message for them because I think it’s a lost cause. It’s a lost cause in the sense that they don’t know me, but they have already made a judgment,” she said in a television interview aired on Friday morning.
Asked on GMA News TV to address her critics, the Vice President said there was no point in trying to reach out to those who had closed their minds about her.
“Their judgment is not coming from people who know me personally. Perhaps I can give a message to those who have open minds, but most of them have closed their minds, so there’s no point in wasting time on them,” Robredo said.
Target of vitriol
Since quitting the Cabinet in December over differences with President Duterte, Robredo, the interim chair of the Liberal Party, has become the target of vitriol by the President’s army of online supporters, including Mocha Uson, a former show biz starlet who now runs a pro-administration blog.
Constructive criticism
Though dismissive of those who had made up their minds about her, Robredo said she was thankful to the people who gave her the benefit of the doubt.
“Those with open minds are the ones whose comments matter to us, because it allows us to look at ourselves when we commit mistakes,” she said.
“It’s also not right to keep getting praise when we are doing wrong,” Robredo said.
Mr. Duterte’s supporters have ratcheted up their attacks on the widow of Interior Secretary Jesse Robredo since she left his Cabinet in December.
Robredo resigned her post as housing czar after she had been told via text message to stop attending Cabinet meetings.
Mr. Duterte said he had received reports that Robredo was joining ouster rallies.
She denied this. In fact, what the Vice President attended was a Bantayog ng mga Bayani event honoring martial law heroes.
Robredo, who has since expressed her intention to become the voice of the opposition, has been criticized by Uson and other haters for, among other things, her magazine covers and her vacation in the United States at the height of a typhoon that hit the Bicol region.
Accusations of luxury
Recently, a pro-Duterte blog accused her of living a life of luxury after she had a photo taken with her “personal yoga trainer.”
It was later learned that the training was part of a fitness program for the staff of the Office of the Vice President.
Robredo has generally shrugged off the online hate, saying she has not even read Uson’s blog.
“I would have to admit that I have not read her blog and I don’t intend to read it,” she said at an Inquirer forum in December.
A few weeks earlier, her office had been compelled to address vicious rumors on Facebook that she was pregnant, saying it was part of a “well-funded demolition campaign” against her.