President Rodrigo Duterte in a speech in Bukidnon claimed that his gaydar sensed that Otso Diretso senatorial candidate Florin Hilbay is hiding his real gender identity by using the actress Agot Isidro.

Duterte told Hilbay that the latter should not be embarrassed by his gender identity which already reached to the point that he’s already using a pretty actress like Agot to cover it.

“Florin Hilbay is a lawyer. But he’s gay. His girlfriend is Igot Isidro. They’re always together. Agot rather, not Igot. Do you think he’s gay?I don’t have a problem with gays, but this particular gay is a… They always criticize me, Hilbay and Agot, until they ended up being a couple. Because they’re always together,” Duterte said.

“He acts like a man and pretends that Agot is his girlfriend. Be true to yourself. You’re gay. Don’t hide behind a cover. You were made by God. God made a mistake. Just because he’s a God does not mean he is incapable of making mistakes,” he added.

The President also admitted that he’s also part of the LGBT community before and he said that everyone deserves to be happy.

“I was once gay. Am I straight or gay? So what if I’m gay? What is it to them? My — it’s my life. I deserve to be happy. Why stop the gays when they’re made by the government — God? It’s already God’s problem why he made gays. Why would we make fun of the gays? Insult them and not accept them at… Yeah,” he said.

In his speech yesterday in Tuguegarao, he also said the same thing about Hilbay.

“Naging solicitor general wala namang gawa, pinuno ang opisina niya ng mga bakla,” Duterte said referring to Hilbay who’s a former Solicitor General.

He also asked the audience to guess the gender identity of his critic Sen. Antonio Trillanes IV who’s also part of the Magdalo.

Duterte, during his days as Mayor of Davao City, passed an ordinance in favor of the LGBT community.

In 2017, he also bared his plan to make a commission for LGBT.

Magdalo Rep. Gary Alejano insisted that his group ‘Otso Diretso’ is not with the ‘dilawan’, saying that they’re not even connected with former President Noynoy Aquino.

In a press conference, Alejano pointed out that even they’re criticizing the current administration, it doesn’t mean that they’re part of the yellows.

Yellow is the trademark political color of the Liberal Party during the time of former Presidents Cory Aquino and Benigno Aquino III.

“The story of Otso Diretso or its individual members is not based on the story of the Liberal Party or former President [Noynoy] Aquino,” Alejano said.

“There’s propaganda to paint the previous administration or any critic or opposition member as ‘yellow,’ and that we all have the same faces,” he added.

While Otso Diretso is trying to evade being labeled as Dilawan, this is also the same with the camp of former DILG Secretary Mar Roxas’ who are now wearing blue during his campaigns.

“It was a conscious decision [to change colors] because one mistake [Roxas] made in 2016 was acting like Robin to [Aquino’s] Batman . . . and Robin will never be Batman,” the camp of Roxas said.

The statement from the camp of Roxas made Kris Aquino, sister of Noynoy to criticize the former DILG secretary.

However, Kris also thanked the camp of Roxas for making her reconcile with her brother after one year of not talking to each other.

“you were a blessing in disguise cong. Erice. Because of you & your candidate, our FAMILY has moved so much closer to becoming WHOLE again… hindi na kailangan maging divided between Team N and Team K, because more than any other family, alam namin how temporary power and political alliances can be, BUT the whole of Monday, my sisters & i communicated a TRUTH & a BOND shared by every other Filipino regardless of political affiliation: HINDI MO TINATALIKURAN ANG KADUGO MO. DAHIL SA UMPISA AT HULI, ANG HINDI MANGIIWAN SA YO- PAMILYA.” Aquino said.

The campaign team of Mar Roxas shared that they’re using a different approach on how they will win the 2019 senatorial elections.

According to Caloocan Representative Edgar Erice, campaign manager of Roxas, they said that they’re avoiding to publicly criticize President Rodrigo Duterte unlike the other bets of Otso Diretso.

Erice said that they’re making a way to show that they’re still part of the opposition without mentioning President Duterte’s name directly by talking on “specific policies.”

He said that they’re doing it because Duterte’s popularity made his critics go down.

“I agree with most of them, but surveys show that all those who hit him are down. The harder you hit him, the lower you go.” Erice said.

The camp of Roxas cited what happened to Magdalo Rep. Gary Alejano who’s openly criticizing the President, according to them, despite the popularity of the former Navy Officer, he’s performing poorly on the senatorial election survey.

In some surveys, all the candidates of Otso-Diretso didn’t reach the Magic 12 even Roxas who became the closest rival of Duterte in the last presidential elections.

Unlike in 2016 where Roxas was openly criticizing Duterte, now he’s not releasing statements about the President and only doing campaign silently.

Meanwhile, President Duterte is still publicly criticizing the opposition bets including Roxas in some of his speeches.

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According to a political analyst, the strategy of the Liberal Party made it’s candidate unpopular in the 2019 senatorial elections because people just knew the opposition candidates by calling them ‘Otso Diretso.’

In an interview with Inquirer, the political analyst said that LP focused on endorsing “Otso Diretso” too much instead of promoting them individually that made their campaign to backfire.

“They had two brands to build, Otso Diretso and the individual candidates. And they chose the former. Now Otso Diretso is more popular than the individual candidates,” the analyst said.

According to him, in an election candidate must ensure that the people would remember their name because, in the end, the voters are going to shade the politician’s name.

“They invested in a name that won’t even be on the ballot.” the analyst said.

While the opposition is calling themselves in the campaign as part of Otso Diretso, in the ballot, they’re listed as a representative of Liberal Party (LP) which might confuse the voters.

Also in the recent Magdalo survey, all candidates of Otso Diretso didn’t enter the magic 12.

Meanwhile, one of the camps of one of the Otso Diretso candidates, Mar Roxas blamed the ‘yellow’ brand of the Liberal Party for their defeat in the last presidential elections.

Roxas is also campaigning solo, unlike his other party-mates who are visiting different areas in the Philippines together.

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Senator Antonio Trillanes IV is not convinced that senatorial candidate Christopher ‘Bong’ Go don’t really have a tattoo at his back.

In his tweet, Trillanes insisted that Go is still not safe from accusations, showing a photo of the right hand of the President while playing basketball.

The photo shows Go having a mark in his right shoulder which according to Trillanes might be a sign of his tattoo.

Trillanes suggested to Go that he should do more laser tattoo removal because he can still see some sign of his tattoo.

“Huli ka! So,Bong Go HAD a triad tattoo afterall. Magpa-additional laser tattoo removal sessions pa dapat si Bong Go bago naghubad kasi may mga bakat at tiratira pa.” Trillanes said.

Huli ka! So,Bong Go HAD a triad tattoo afterall. Magpa-additional laser tattoo removal sessions pa dapat si Bong Go bago naghubad kasi may mga bakat at tiratira pa.
Ngayon,if he still insists na wala talaga,then ipa-examine natin PUBLICLY sa mga INDEPENDENT dermatologists. Pusoy! pic.twitter.com/BzVr6QzZFH

— Sonny Trillanes IV (@TrillanesSonny) April 13, 2019

He also said that if the senatorial candidate insisted that he doesn’t have a tattoo, he should let an independent dermatologist examine it.

Hugpong ng Pagbabago (HNP) Chairman and Davao City Mayor Inday Sara Duterte believed that Otso Diretso senatorial candidate Samira Gutoc intended to wear her life vest in a wrong way during her visit in Masinloc, Zambales to catch the attention of the public.

In an interview, Duterte said that any politicians will do their best to be remembered by the public even in an extreme way.

“Yun nga ang sinasabi ko, baka din sinadya niya kasi niya it’s election time.. it’s campaign time at kung ano ang magagawa ng isang kandidato para mapag usapan siya ay gagawin talaga yan ng isang kandidato,” Inday Sara said.

“Dahil yun ang hinahanap nila para people will look at them and listen to them,” she added.

Gutoc became viral on social media after the netizens noticed that one of her photos shows her wearing a life vest incorrectly.

However, Gutoc said that it’s better to make some mistakes in wearing life vest than having the wrong principle.

“Mali man po ang pagkakasuot ko ng life vest, hindi naman mali ang aking paninindigan.  Ang mahirap ay tama ang iyong suot, pero ang kaluluwa, puso’t isipan ay naibenta na sa China,” Gutoc said.

Aside from Gutoc, other Otso Diretso candidates went to Masinloc to urge the President to go to Scarborough Shoal and defend our claim against China.