(UPDATED) Well, readers, if you thought pugnacious Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro Locsin Jr. is going to apologize to the reporter he verbally abused early this week, you’re very much mistaken.
In fact, Locsin is still fuming at The Philippine Daily Inquirer journalist Jhesset Enano, whom he accused of slandering President Rodrigo Duterte in a tweet today. He also slammed the Inquirer, perhaps the country’s most-lauded publication, as an “idiot newspaper,” and petulantly demanded an apology on the president’s behalf.
“I will apologize to the lady [if] she apologizes to Duterte for her slanders and that idiot newspaper vows never to slant stories about him again,” he fumed, before going on to simultaneously flex his vocab muscles and underline his well-known capacity for contemptuous online speech.
“I have an inexhustible (sic) supply of scurrilities,” he added.
(Generally people don’t brag about being scurrilous, but if anyone would, we guess it’d be ol’ T-Loc.)
“Her and the Inquirer’s president works his ass off for the country,” Locsin continued. “Say sorry. Now.”
I will apologize to the lady she apologizes to Duterte for her slanders and that idiot newspaper vows never to slant stories about him again. I have an inexhustible supply of scurrilities. Her and the Inquirer’s president works his ass off for the country. Say sorry. Now.
— Teddy Locsin Jr. (@teddyboylocsin) November 7, 2019
Read: Newspaper slams Foreign Affairs Secretary Locsin over vulgar tweet aimed at reporter
Locsin’s feud with the reporter and the Inquirer started when Enano posted on Twitter that Duterte couldn’t be found at the closing ceremonies of this month’s ASEAN Summit in Bangkok. Locsin, who represented Duterte in the ceremonies, tweeted that the president had to leave early to catch a flight. This was followed by a harsher tweet in which he insulted Enano by asking, “Uh, did you get the putangina I sent you?”
(For those that don’t know, putang ina happens to be most Filipinos’ favorite profanity (or scurrility!), and literally translates to “your mother’s a whore.” Just goes to show what a classy diplomat Locsin is.)
In response, the Inquirer yesterday issued a statement defending Enano and slamming Locsin for verbally abusing her.
Locsin’s demand today for an apology attracted a lot of passive-aggressiveness from netizens, many of whom replied to him with the millennial/Gen-Z dismissive retort du jour: “OK, boomer.”
But if you thought that’d be enough to cow T-Loc, again, you’d be wrong.
Thanks. That’s the generation the created the wealth of your world and composed the greatest talents in the past 100 years. https://t.co/F7tp4xqZac
— Teddy Locsin Jr. (@teddyboylocsin) November 7, 2019
Instead of shushing, Locsin replied with the tweet, “Thanks. That’s the generation the created the wealth of your world and composed the greatest talents in the past 100 years.”
OK, boomer.
It’s not a stretch to say that Locsin often acts in a distinctly undiplomatic manner, especially given that he’s the country’s top diplomat.
In addition to routinely peppering his tweets with four-letter words, in June, he called Vice President Leni Robredo “stupid” when the latter criticized his move to cancel all courtesy diplomatic passports. Before his appointment to the Department of Foreign Affairs, he also courted backlash in 2016 when he defended Hitler on Twitter and said that the Nazis “were right after all.”
But Locsin’s attacks on the media did not end with Enano. This morning, BBC correspondent Howard Johnson reposted a screenshot of another Locsin tweet aimed at Philippine Star journalist Marc Cayabyab that read, simply, “F*ck you.”
The fresh scurrility (dang, he wasn’t kidding!) was made after Cayabyab subtweeted Locsin’s slander allegation against Enano then quoted Republic Act 6713, which states that government officials have to perform their duties with the highest degree of professionalism.
The Philippine Secretary of Foreign Affairs, the country’s top diplomat, was criticised yesterday for swearing at a @inquirerdotnet journalist. This morning he tweeted this to a @PhilippineStar journalist… then deleted it. pic.twitter.com/jlTj3jIvFV
— Howard Johnson (@Howardrjohnson) November 7, 2019
Shortly after issuing it, Locsin quietly deleted the tweet from his account.
Jack Mehoff says
Love Teddy. He takes no prisoners.