1994 Manila Film Festival scandal

The Manila Film Festival (not to be confused with the Metro Manila Film Festival) was an annual film festival held to celebrate the founding anniversary of Manila on 24 June 1571. The televised awarding ceremonies for the 1994 edition were held on 22 June at the Manila Midtown Ramada Hotel (now the site of the Robinsons Manila shopping mall) in the Ermita district. The accounting firm SyCip Gorres Velayo & Co. (SGV) was tasked with tabulating the results and selecting the winners. The hosts for the Best Actor category were Ruffa Gutierrez, who was also a nominee for the Best Actress award, and Nanette Medved, while the hosts for the Best Actress category were Ruffa's younger brother Rocky, Viveka Babajee, who represented Mauritius in the Miss Universe 1994 pageant held in Manila a month before and was also a co-contestant of Ruffa in the Miss World 1993 pageant in South Africa, and Gretchen Barretto. Lolit Solis, who was the talent manager of Medved and Best Actor nominee Gabby Concepcion, was the event's talent coordinator. ==Events==

During the Best Actor award, Ruffa and Medved jointly announced Gabby Concepcion as the winner in that category for his role in the drama film Loretta, which was loosely based on the Lorena Bobbitt case and where Gutierrez was also in the lead actress role. which led to Barretto expressing her astonishment and then looking suspiciously at her co-hosts in front of the cameras. While Ruffa was ascending the stage to claim the trophy, Babajee was heard on the microphone telling a sleepy-looking Rocky Gutierrez, "Take it, take it!" referring to the cue cards containing the names of the winners, which he pocketed, an act which was also caught on camera. The cards disappeared after the event. SGV alerted Manila Mayor Alfredo Lim on what had happened, prompting Lim to take to the stage after the conclusion of the ceremony, by which time the hosts and most attendees had left, and announce to remaining audience members and journalists that cheating had occurred and that Manzano and Melendez were the real winners. ==Impact==

The incident was the second time within a year that Ruffa Gutierrez figured in a controversy, having been accused in 1993 by Senator Ernesto Maceda of engaging in high-priced prostitution in Brunei along with other actresses and models in what became known as the "Brunei Beauties" scandal, which she denied in a Senate hearing. Edu Manzano, the real winner in the Best Actor category, called the incident the "craziest thing that ever happened" to him. The scandal generated massive domestic and international coverage and uproar, with then-First Lady Amelita Ramos complaining that it dominated discussions among her hosts during an official visit to Europe. The Alex Boncayao Brigade, an urban hit-squad formation which broke off from the communist New People's Army, threatened to assassinate those implicated in the controversy unless they were brought to justice by the legal system, ==Investigation==

An angry Lim ordered the Manila City Council to create a five-person fact-finding committee led by Vice Mayor Lito Atienza before any further action could be taken. In an interview with Ricky Lo prior to her departure, she expressed her belief that there was a conspiracy to manipulate the results but maintained that she was a victim who was unknowingly used in that effort, as she was a "stranger" in the country. She denied meeting Lolit Solis but said that she was recruited as a host after being approached by a man she could not identify, and agreed to do so after seeking advice from Annabelle Rama. She also maintained that the cue card she handled carried Ruffa's name and that her recorded instructions to Rocky were meant to tell him to get the trophy for his sister. She also acknowledged that she was a house guest of the Gutierrezes during her stay in the Philippines. Eventually, Solis took responsibility for the incident as its mastermind and asked for forgiveness from the public, saying that she did it for Concepcion, who she said "instigated" the plot and who she said she "loved like a son". She also implicated Medved, while clearing the Gutierrezes. In an interview years after, she admitted fearing that Concepcion, whose career at the time, she said, was fading, would lose out on the award to Richard Gomez, the lead actor in Maalaala Mo Kaya: The Movie, and did not actually expect Edu Manzano to win instead. Of the Filmfest Seven, Solis was the only person convicted of the charges related to the controversy and was ordered to pay a fine and placed under court supervision under probationary law after pleading guilty. In 2002, the Manila Regional Trial Court Branch 8 headed by Judge Felixberto Olalia Jr. dismissed the fraud charges against the Gutierrezes after their lawyers filed a demurrer to evidence, which was not countered by prosecutors. The judge ruled that while the defendants displayed deceit during the incident, there was insufficient evidence to prove that damages had been inflicted on the city of Manila, which was also in charge of the film festival committee. Olalia ordered the Manila city government to shoulder the cost of litigation amounting to P500,000, while also ordering the Gutierrez siblings to pay a sum of P50,000 as a fine. ==Aftermath==

Gabby Concepcion quit acting after the scandal and moved to the United States, where he worked as a real estate agent before returning to the Philippines in 2008 to make a comeback in the entertainment industry. Viveka Babajee pursued her acting and modeling career in India before committing suicide in Mumbai in 2010, 16 years to the day Gretchen Barretto spoke out on the scandal, from reasons unrelated to the controversy. Nanette Medved and Rocky Gutierrez continued their acting careers but later retired, with Medved focusing on philanthropy. but had stopped attending awarding ceremonies after the controversy, which she referred to as both a "nightmare and the biggest lesson in her life". Alfredo Lim's swift handling of the controversy raised his national profile and contributed to his decision to launch an ultimately unsuccessful bid for the Philippine presidency in the 1998 elections. ==In popular culture==

The controversy was depicted in the 1995 biopic Alfredo Lim, Batas ng Maynila, with Eddie Garcia portraying Lim, Glenda Garcia as Gretchen Barretto, renamed as Greta Barredo in the film, Lani Lobangco as Nanette Medved, renamed as Nanette Mendez and Joy Viado as Lolit Solis, who was renamed Lilet Salas in the film. Those involved in the scandal were renamed in the film such as Ruffa Gutierrez (Rosa Gavielez), Gabby Concepcion (Gary Consolacion) and Edu Manzano (Eddie Magsino), except for Aiko Melendez and Viveka Babajee. ==References==