This document summarizes several cases of alleged plagiarism by prominent Philippine politicians and public figures. It describes instances where Senator Tito Sotto, businessman Manny Pangilinan, and Supreme Court Justice Mariano Del Castillo were accused of lifting parts of speeches without proper attribution. It also outlines plagiarism allegations regarding tourism slogans and a photographer who submitted others' work as his own in competitions. The document discusses the responses and outcomes of these various cases.

1. Speeches in the Philippines

2. Sotto delivers his turno en contra speech on the Reproductive Health bill
at the Senate. Photo by Junny Roy for ABS-CBNnews.com

3. Sen. Tito Sotto’s Reproductive Health Bill ( RH )
speeches
• The gist: Parts of Sotto’s two speeches on his stand on
the controversial RH bill were lifted from different online
sources, drawing an online firestorm.
• What Sotto did: While Sotto initially denied plagiarizing parts of his
first RH bill speech (saying “blogger lang iyon,” drawing even
more flak), his then-chief of staff,
Atty. Hector Villacorta, admitted that they copied the work of
American blogger Sarah Pope.
• What happened next: Like Sotto, Villacorta saw himself at the
receiving end of criticism, with netizens calling him “stupid” and
“arrogant.”

4. MVP’s graduation speech

6. • The gist: Prominent businessman Manuel V. Pangilinan
was in hot water after it was found that parts of his speech
during Ateneo’s commencement exercises in 2010 were
lifted from passages of other graduation remarks. It was
later discovered that MVP’s previous speeches had
similarities with those made by other well-known figures
such as then-United States President Barack Obama.

7. • What Pangilinan did: The telco executive immediately
issued an apology and offered to retire from his duties in
Ateneo, but the university’s board of trustees rejected it.
The businessman then tendered his “irrevocable”
resignation and relinquished the honorary degree
conferred on him.
• What happened next: Pangilinan eventually regained the
public’s trust for being “man enough” to take full
responsibility for the actions of his speech writer, whose
name was not disclosed. Last year, the businessman
joked about not giving any graduation speeches in the
future, calling it “toxic” to one’s health.

8. SUPREME COURT Justice Mariano del
Castillo’s ruling on comfort women

9. • The gist: In what is dubbed as a first in the Supreme
Court, a decision penned by Associate Justice Mariano
del Castillo on World War II comfort women showed
that numerous parts were copied from materials written
by legal experts abroad without proper attribution. An
impeachment complaint was then filed against him over
the incident.

10. • What del Castillo did: Castillo’s lawyer, Atty. Louie
Oximer, said early in 2012 that the SC justice’s alleged
plagiarism is not a high crime and therefore cannot be
considered an impeachable offense.
• What happened next: Last May, then-Senate President
Juan Ponce Enrile hinted that Del Castillo was safe from
impeachment, saying that the case against him should be
a “mere civil damage suit and not an impeachment
case.”

11. • The gist: Tourism slogan “ Pilipinas Kay Ganda” drew
criticism a week after its launch in 2010 after its logo had
a striking similarity to Poland’s “Polska,” from the font, the
colors and the use of a tree. An application where users
can make a personalized name logo with the tagline “Kay
Ganda” then made the rounds on social media sites as
Filipinos made fun of the alleged plagiarism committed by
the advertising agency tapped by DOT.

12. The Philippines' scrapped "Pilipinas Kay Ganda" logo (right) and
Poland's "Polska (left)."

13. • What DOT did: Then-DOT Undersecretary Vicente
“Enteng” Romano III, who was in charge of DOT’s
planning and promotions section, took full responsibility
for the campaign and left his post. He also apologized to
then-President Benigno Aquino III, then-Tourism
Secretary Alberto Lim and to the public over the
controversy.
• What happened next: The “Pilipinas Kay Ganda”
campaign was scrapped and eventually replaced by
the “It’s more fun in the Philippines” slogan, which
became an Internet hit. HOWEVER.....

14. • The gist: Just after its launch in January 2012, the
Department of Tourism’s (DOT) “It’s more fun in the
Philippines” slogan was criticized for allegedly being a
copycat of a 1951 Swiss tourism slogan that read “It’s
more fun in Switzerland.”

15. • What DOT did: Tourism Secretary Mon Jimenez took to
Twitter to react on the issue, saying that the similarity is
just a coincidence.
• What happened next: The plagiarism issue eventually
died down, especially after Swiss Ambassador to Manila
Ivo Sieber expressed his support for the “It’s more fun in
the Philippines” campaign.

16. Other High-Profile Plagiarism Cases
in the Philippines
• The accusation: In December 2010, UP College of Law
Dean Atty. Marvic Leonen submitted his resignation letter
to UP Diliman Chancellor Sergio Cao after he was
accused of plagiarizing parts of an article he wrote for
the Journal of the Integrated Bar of the Philippines. A
group of lawyers-who called themselves the Philippine
Social Justice Foundation (Philjust)-claimed that the
article, which was published in 2004, had segments that
"used original source material without proper attribution."

17. • The response: A GMA News Online report
noted: "Leonen acknowledged that he failed to supply at
least two attributions in the article titled ’Weaving
Worldviews: Implications of Constitutional Challenges to
the Indigenous Peoples Rights Act of 1997.’ The
materials that Leonen borrowed were from the American
law professor Owen Lynch’s dissertation and "friend of
the court" brief co-written with Romina Picolotti." At the
time, Lynch was a visiting professor at the UP College of
Law.

18. • The aftermath: Leonen’s students and colleagues
lauded him for owning up to his supposedly inadvertent
plagiarism. He went on to serve as Dean of UP College
of Law until June 2011. In November 2012, Leonen
was appointed an associate justice of the Supreme
Court, the youngest appointee since 1938. Leonen was
then just 49 years old.

19. MARK JOSEPH SOLIS AND
HIS STOLEN SHOTS
• The accusation: In September 2013, The Philippine
Star reported that amateur photographer Mark Joseph Solis
apologized and withdrew his participation in the 2nd Calidad
Humana National Essay Photography Competition organized by
the embassy of Chile "after it was found that the entry that won
him the top prize belonged to Brazil-based social worker Gregory
John Smith." According to the report, Solis submitted an entry
"supposedly depicting a boy from Zamboanga City helping his
father gather seaweed." In reality, the photo was actually Smith’s
"Neptune of the Sea," which was taken in 2006 in Rio de Janeiro.

20. • The reponse: Solis reasoned that "the sheer amount of the prize,
the stiff competition, and the unique opportunity to be abroad
blinded me from undertaking what is supposed to be an honest and
a rightful conduct." However, it was later discovered that this wasn’t
the first time Solis took a photo and passed it off as his own
competition entry. Solis, a graduate student at UP’s National
College of Public Administration and Governance (NCPAG), has
committed the same offense at least six times before. Despite
these revelations, he went on TV and shared a sob story about his
family being in need. However, people who know him personally
say that the "emotional interview" was just staged to make it look
like Solis was poor. They said he actually had trendy gadgets at his
real home in Las Piñas.

21. • The aftermath: UP’s NCPAG is conducting an inquiry on Solis. His
former co-worker, Maricris Valte has also come forward to reveal to
the public that Solis has, indeed, made a habit of lying about
practically everything. He may have also "padded" his resume. Valte
disputed Solis' claims that he led the research arm of the Philippine
Society of Public Administration (PSPA). She explained: "He was
contracted for my project December 1, 2012 and unless this is where
he spent those times that he was absent from work, there is no way
that he could have been 'leading' the research arm of PSPA. I
recommended the pre-termination of his contract effective March 8,
2013." Amid all this, Solis dares to say that he has made an appeal
to keep the prize money awarded to him for winning the 2nd Calidad
Humana National Essay Photography Competition.

22. CDO’S HAM HEADACHE
• The accusation: In September 2013, Victor Agustin (via his
Cocktales column published on InterAksyon.com)
reported that Purefoods and CDO were at war over their
Christmas hams. "Purefoods had maintained that it had
been using the Fiesta brand since 1980, way ahead of
CDO. CDO, on the other hand, countered that while it had
started marketing its Yuletide ham under the Pista brand
only in 2006, the names ’Fiesta’ and ’Pista’ are not only
both generic but are also spelled differently," Agustin
revealed.

23. • The response: Agustin said that "Director-General Ricardo
Blancaflor of the Intellectual Property Office released a decision
which reversed a finding by his office’s legal affairs bureau that
earlier cleared CDO of the Purefoods complaint for unfair
competition." Blancaflor added, "What tipped the case in favor of
Purefoods, according to Blancaflor, was CDO’s having launched
in 2006 a ’Make Christmas even more special’ advertising
campaign that was eerily similar to Purefoods’ ongoing ’Dapat
ganito ka-espesyal’ campaign." Plus, he also pointed out that
"CDO has since packaged its ham in paper bags with dimensions
and colors that were "confusingly similar" to that of Purefoods."

24. • The aftermath: Agustin noted:
"Aside from ordering the
seizure of the Pista ham
labels, signs, prints, cartons
and wrappers, Blancaflor also
fined CDO P100,000-rejecting
as unsubstantiated the claim
of Purefoods that it lost at
least P27. 6 million in
unrealized income because of
the copycat packaging-and
another P300,000 in lawyer’s
fees.