HONG KONG—With Chinese President Xi Jinping underscoring the importance of media exchange, Beijing has promised to continue its scholarship program for government media officials in the Philippines, Presidential Communications Operations Office (PCOO) Secretary Martin Andanar said.

“It is a very good indication that China is very committed to helping our government media improve its services,” Andanar said in a press briefing.

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The Philippines and China also signed an exchange of letters providing for broadcasting equipment for Malacañang’s communications office, worth 17 million yuan (about P140.8 million), during President Duterte’s visit on Tuesday, where he met with Xi on the sidelines of the Boao Forum for Asia.

The PCOO, which has a P1.38-billion budget for 2018, has been widely criticized for committing a series of booboos.

P100M worth of aid

It was lambasted for, among other errors, using the logo of Dole Philippines, the pineapple company, as visual to an announcement by DOLE, or the Department of Labor and Employment, and for issuing—and later recalling—press IDs full of grammatical errors to the Malacañang Press Corps.

Aside from continuing the scholarships for the next four years, China is set to provide P100 million worth of assistance to the Philippine Broadcast Service, Andanar said.

Asked about the fact that Chinese media were state-controlled, Andanar said the Philippines was looking at the technical know-how the country could learn from China.

“In terms of management, in terms of the technology that they are using, we in the Philippine government media have so much to learn from them,” Andanar said.—LEILA B. SALAVERRIA

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