Samira Gutoc Rues How Youth Supporters Deserted Her
Senatorial candidate Samira Gutoc trended Tuesday as netizens reacted to a video of her expressing her frustrations towards the youth, whom she said left her over her political choices in the May 9 elections despite having given her "heart and soul" to them.
In the viral clip, Gutoc, who is running with Presidential candidate Isko Moreno, said she did not lose her principles even as a politician. She will stand against what's wrong, but she has to win, she said, alluding to the backlash she's been receiving since switching parties.
"Hindi ako nawala sa prinsipyo ko. Politician ako pero I will stand against corruption, I will stand against what's wrong pero I have to win. I have to win an election tas iniwanan ako ng mga kabataan...," Gutoc said.
"I gave my heart and soul to the youth. Sabi ko, I represented you in everything and this is what I get for representing you, for being honest, for being everything that is hated," she added.
A Muslim community organizer for women and persons displaced by armed conflict in Mindanao, Gutoc failed to clinch a Senate seat in the 2019 midterm elections as a candidate under opposition slate Otso Diretso.
She surprised her supporters last year when she joined Aksyon Demokratiko and was named one of the senatorial candidates under Moreno's slate, instead of the ticket of presidential candidate Leni Robredo, her former party mate.
Gutoc earlier said she was hoping to run with Robredo at first, but the Vice President was still undecided then, and Aksyon Demokratiko was offering her a "concrete position" that she said she did not have under the Liberal Party.
Later, Gutoc would say she joined Moreno's slate to escape her old party's "echo chamber".
"Naawa ako kay Samira Gutoc. Iniwan sya ng mga kabataan not because she joined Moreno’s slate. It’s because she stood silent and turned blind eye while Moreno slandered her former allies and became open to a Duterte endorsement," Twitter user @scottmarttin said, reacting to Gutoc's video.