IT TAKES a lot to grip the attention of a country where women give birth to fish, men crucify each other and statues weep blood - but this is a scandal that has everything.
It began at the Philippine equivalent of the Oscars with stars, lies and videotape. As the drums rolled, movie queen Gretchen Baretto announced: 'And the best actress for 1994 is . . .' She paused to allow her co-presenter, Miss Mauritius Viveka Babajee, to read out the winner's name. Eleven million television viewers and a studio audience of senators and mayors held their breath. 'Ruffa Gutierrez,' blurted Miss Mauritius. Baretto's mouth dropped open. 'I didn't expect this,' said the effervescent Gutierrez as she bounded up to take the award. Nor did the auditors who had counted the judges' votes. Nor did Baretto: there was an entirely different name on the card.
Moments later it was the turn of 'best actress' Gutierrez and actress Nanette Medved to hand out the award for best actor. She opened the envelope and read out the name of Gabby Concepcion - the hunky co-star of her new movie about the life of Lorena Bobbitt. Again the auditors were in shock. Again the judges had chosen an entirely different actor.
Stars and lies deepened into swindlers and scandal. At the end of the show Manila's mayor and the festival organiser, Alfredo Lim, announced the mistake, ordered a police investigation and the return of the trophies. It might have ended there. But four days later Gutierrez and Concepcion still had the trophies. Lim, the media and every columnist, journalist and bar-room pundit in the Philippines were furious. Already sick of its own junk movies and their saccharin self-important starlets, the Philippine people found this too much to stomach. The revulsion was too strong. It was one last, fat, raw lie they wouldn't swallow.
The nation vomited. Or that, at least, is how it seemed to me when I arrived five days after the ceremony. Every taxi driver, politician, columnist, street urchin, waitress and bellboy I spoke to professed to be repelled, angered and ashamed. Film director Marilou Abbaya told the press: 'This is like a boil finally erupting.' It made Pinatubo look tame.
I watched the evening news. The scandal not only dominated the headlines but after the facts were dispensed with, the silver-haired newscaster leaned forward and did something I have never seen before. 'On a personal note,' he said, 'I would like to add something. This episode is an international disgrace. We are being made to look like a nation of cheats and villains. The guilty parties must be brought to justice . . .' The cameras rolled in approval and the newscaster continued to vent his spleen for a couple of minutes before he recovered his composure and got on with the news.