The Generics Act – Finding a Middle Ground for the Good of the Public

February 5, 2025

We take it for granted now, but back in the 80s and earlier, the brand of medicine that your doctor prescribed you was the one you got. As a patient, you would get the brand that was doc-prescribed – no matter how expensive it was! In the Philippines, cheaper alternatives existed, but the public really didn’t know any better. Unless you were a doctor, you wouldn’t really know the generic name of the medicine. You had to rely on what brand the doctor was pushing. Even the packaging of the drugs only had the brand name, not the generic name. How would the public know that there were cheaper alternatives, that were as effective? All this changed with the Generics Act of 1988, or R.A.

Life Lessons from our favorite Doc Willie Ong

September 18, 2024

I am reminded of what really matters in life because of former senate aspirant, vlogger, cardiologist, and former vice presidential aspirant Doctor Willie Ong. Watching his vlogs as he continues his fight against cancer is a wake up call to one’s mortality. Even as he undergoes chemotherapy, he continue to post content. The purpose is to show the world and his followers the effects of cancer – its symptoms and challenges, unfiltered. A blow by blow of what an actual fight against cancer entails. His wife Liza officially announced his withdrawal from the 2025 senatorial race to focus on his cancer treatments. I think it’s all for the best. In one of his vlogs, he mentions that part of the reason his health deteriorated is

Branding Duterte: Why Authenticity is the Ultimate Campaign Strategy

July 3, 2024

The 2016 presidential campaign of Rodrigo Duterte proved a vital lesson: authenticity is the best political strategy. While other candidates followed traditional scripts, Duterte embraced his true self, creating a powerful connection with the Filipino electorate. The Power of Authenticity in Politics Mayor Rodrigo Duterte’s brash talk, macho humor, and kitschy fashion initially made some uncomfortable. However, these same traits endeared him to the majority of voters. We framed these characteristics as his core strengths rather than liabilities. He never minced words and remained unabashedly himself, embodying a level of transparency rarely seen in high-level politics. Developing the Rodrigo Duterte Campaign Strategy The Duterte communications team capitalized on this unique brand. Instead of forcing him into a “cookie-cutter” politico mold, we leaned into “Digong” as

The Double-Edged Feed: What Social Media Cost Us

June 30, 2024

Part 3 of 3 When I wrote about how free Facebook changed the campaign, I said the questions of social media ethics it raised were lengthy enough to deserve their own post. This is that post. I’ve put it off, if I’m honest, because it’s the hardest one to write. It’s easy to tell the story of a clever, cash-strapped campaign that found a new way to be heard. It’s harder to sit with what that new way also made possible — and to admit I was in the middle of it, not watching from the outside. I’m not writing this to absolve myself. I’m writing it because the same tools that let us compete did things I’m still weighing, years later. We are forced

Feeling the Pulse: Was the Nation Ready for a Duterte Presidency?

June 19, 2024

Part 1 of 3 I remember back in 2014, Lito Banayo showed me a presentation prepared by a member of Mr. Bong Go’s staff. The objective was to test public reaction to a possible Duterte candidacy in the 2016 elections. I remember thinking it was an interesting proposition. Finally, a Mindanaon candidate who could truly represent the interests of the region! After what Lito showed me, I drew up a budget and told him that the right kind of exposure would cost ₱40 million. But we found ways to trim it down to eight — and here’s how we did it. It’s a story from more than a decade ago, but the principle behind it is one I’d still hand any strategist working today: the

The Benevolent Dictator: Lessons from Political Campaigning in the Pre-Social Media Era

June 5, 2024

“You should get this man.” That’s what Boo Chanco — then vice president of the news division at ABS-CBN — said to Sergio “Serge” Osmeña III sometime in the 1990s, while pointing directly at me. I still don’t know if Boo was serious or just enjoying himself at my expense. But Serge took him at his word. That offhand introduction turned into one of the defining professional relationships of my career, one that would take me from the newsroom into the war rooms of some of the most consequential campaigns in modern Philippine political history — including the campaign that put Noynoy Aquino in Malacañang in 2010. Understand who Serge Osmeña III was before you understand what he taught me. Born December 13, 1943, he

The ABS-CBN Shutdown, 4 Years Later: An Insider’s Honest Reckoning

May 8, 2024

It is now, four years after it happened, that I’ve finally made peace with what it means for one of the largest networks in the country to lose its franchise. ABS-CBN has, and continues to have, a place very dear to my heart. And I can’t say I was totally blindsided by the events of May 5, 2020. Unknown to most, the seeds were sown long before Mayor Digong ever thought about running for President — and I watched it happen from inside two worlds that were about to collide. How the ABS-CBN Franchise Fight Actually Started Here’s something most retrospectives on the ABS-CBN shutdown get wrong: this didn’t start with Duterte. The renewal process actually began under President Noynoy Aquino, all the way back

The Manilay Mansion – A Glimpse to our Past in GenSan

March 27, 2024

Its been years since I had a chance to go around General Santos. In one of those trips, I happen to visit a mansion in Purok Malakas at the back of SaveMore. The folks around call it the Manilay Mansion. I was informed that the Manilay Mansion is a miniature version (although it is by no means small, as it is an actual mansion) of the original house in Batangas City. It is owned by the family of Warren Manilay, a businessman, who used to live in Batangas. When Manilay and his family moved to General Santos City, he wanted to take a part of his home with him. He did not just bring furniture from his home – he brought his entire house!

Graphic for the final installment of the Edwin Espejo series on Philippine politics and the Duterte social media narrative.

Beyond the ‘Troll’ Label: A Reality Check for the Opposition

March 25, 2024

Part seven of seven. Edwin Espejo published this series on Facebook in June and July 2021. It is republished here in full and lightly copyedited; the introduction below is mine, not his. I am a subject of the series as well as its publisher. It concerns the 2016 campaign and not subsequent events, including the proceedings now before the International Criminal Court. Full editorial note and series index → Introduction by Nic Gabunada This is the last installment, and it is the one that has aged most interestingly. Edwin wrote it in July 2021, a year out from the end of the term. His argument was that the opposition kept losing because it kept explaining its defeats with a villain instead of an assessment —

Graphic from Edwin Espejo’s six-part series on the 2016 Philippine presidential election, highlighting the retrospective on the Duterte campaign movement.

The Ad Men Can Only Be as Good as the Product

March 24, 2024

Part six of seven. Edwin Espejo published this series on Facebook in June and July 2021. It is republished here in full and lightly copyedited; the introduction below is mine, not his. I am a subject of the series as well as its publisher. It concerns the 2016 campaign and not subsequent events, including the proceedings now before the International Criminal Court. Full editorial note and series index → Introduction by Nic Gabunada They like to call us trolls. It is a convenient word. If the movement was fake, nobody has to sit with the uncomfortable part — that millions of Filipinos were simply fed up. Every time someone reduces 2016 to digital manipulation, they are insulting the people who actually built that result. It was

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