Cebu: Back to 'An Island in the Pacific' slogan?

By now we should be discussing another topic. But it seems that the issue on the Department of Tourism’s (DOT) slogan fiasco continues to simmer. Like I couldn’t believe my ears when Tourism Secretary Alberto “Bertie” Lim said on ANC’s Headstart hosted by Karen Davila, “That Wow! Philippines is a slogan that worked in the Philippines, it worked here, but it didn’t work abroad!” How dense has this fellow become? This only proves that Lim doesn’t know anything about tourism… he is fueled only by hate of the previous administration. It is more than obvious to us that he would never use the Wow! Philippines logo and would go to any length to discredit it.

Tourism is one of the country’s most vital industries as it brings jobs to people even in the remotest parts of the country. Cases in point are tourism destinations like Donsol in Sorsogon, Siargao in Surigao and Dakak in Zamboanga del Norte. Unfortunately, we have a tourism secretary who couldn’t care less about pushing for the wrong slogan. But now that a great number of people have rejected his ill-fated “Pilipinas Kay Ganda” slogan, he still insists on discarding the old and tested Wow! Philippines.

Like what I said, this is a no-brainer… the real reason why Secretary Lim wants to change the tourism slogan is not because it is old, but because the Aquino administration has to pay its political debts… especially those printers who printed his campaign ads and advertising companies that helped his campaign. This was explained on TV by no less than Robert “Bobby” Joseph, chairman emeritus of the National Association of Independent Travel Agencies (NAITAS), that we wrote about last Friday.

With DOT officials still justifying their actions, even after the sudden resignation of Undersecretary Vicente “Enteng” Romano III, I texted our good friend former Tourism Secretary Joseph “Ace” Durano for his comments on this still simmering controversy and here’s his reply in full:

“Hi Bobit, I have to say that the gains in the industry achieved in key international markets can be attributed to the marketing strategy that the DOT and the industry collaborated on. We focused on getting the marking strategy right and executing it efficiently.

“Wow Philippines logo and slogan ‘More than the Usual’ was flexible enough to work with the new marketing strategy. Although in Japan, Korea, Russia and China we came up with a slogan in their respective languages to make the message of Wow Philippines more understandable in those markets.

“In other words, a logo and slogan is no panacea. It’s the effectiveness of the marketing strategies that will make the difference. Ultimately, tourism industry players will be the final judge on the effectiveness of DOT programs. Thanks… Ace Durano.”

I asked Ace Durano to appear on my TV show to talk about this fiasco, but he politely turned me down, saying he had a biased opinion on this matter. This shows to you that there were a lot of decent people under then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.        

Last Thursday morning, Channel 5’s “Usapang Sapul” show had Romano as its guest. Romano merely reiterated what he wrote in his resignation letter and still went to great lengths to justify what he did. He admitted though that they had to rush to create a new logo because he understood that a tourist coming to our shores means a job for a Filipino. This shows that a neophyte (he was with the Black and White Movement) who was “rewarded” for his anti-Arroyo stand knows nothing about tourism issues.

But I have always said, when these people were in the opposition, they nitpicked and found the smallest flaw or problem with the Arroyo administration. But now that they are in power, they have no damn idea on how to handle the responsibilities of government! Let me stress that while there were bad things that happened in the Arroyo government, however, there were great things that happened as well.

In his resignation letter, Romano still insisted that the “Pilipinas Kay Ganda” ad was a “work in progress,” that it wasn’t final. Well, I received a DOT receipt of the cost of the rebranding program which amounted to P712,790. On the invitations alone, the DOT spent P48,000, P46,000 on car stickers alone even with a mobilization fund of P60,000, P70,000 for pyro effects, then a supplementary budget for P398,435, of which P356,000 was for additional graphics alone – and all these for a temporary launch?

If the DOT continues to insist on changing the slogan and Secretary Lim doesn’t have the delicadeza to resign, then I would exhort our fellow Cebuanos in the tourism industry to go back to our old but very successful program… “An Island in the Pacific!” We did that during the Marcos years, when the country had a bad international reputation like what we have now!

* * *

For e-mail responses to this article, write to [email protected] or [email protected]. Avila’s columns can be accessed through www.philstar.com.