“Gomez’s lack of familiarity with the current media ecosystem could result in outdated, out-of-touch communication strategies”
COFFEE shops are like a lake abuzz with outboards, with health advocates getting ill at ease over rumors that a long-time corporate executive is being primed for the post of Presidential Communications Office top-drawer post.
Understandably, the tinnitus aurium has raised alarms in health and policy circles, reminded that the person, Dave Gomez, being rubbed down has had a track record in promoting so-called “smoke-free alternatives.
This revolved around promoting heated tobacco products and vaping as “harm-reduction tools” – a position rather controversial among health advocates.
Some established sources say Gomez, the communications director of PMFTC, Philip Morris International’s Philippine affiliate, is being assessed to replace Ruiz, who was bypassed by the Commission on Appointments but re-appointed in June by President Ferdinand Marcos, Jr. after his appointment in February this year was bypassed by the Commission on Appointments.
Sources at the PCO themselves confirmed the scuttlebutt and were watching developments this week, after Ruiz, a former broadcast reporter and son of former Immigration Associate Commissioner Alfonso Ruiz of Sarrat, Ilocos Norte, thanked the President for his reappointment.
A report by The Examination, an independent newsletter, titled “How industry capture of Filipino officials helped deadlock global tobacco control negotiations” revealed how Philippine delegates to the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control meetings in Panama actively aligned with industry interests.
The report cited statements and actions by Filipino officials that echoed the rhetoric of tobacco companies – undermining global efforts to tighten regulation of nicotine products.
Dr. Ulysses Dorotheo of the Southeast Asia Tobacco Control Alliance was straightforward: “It is completely unacceptable that a government would go… and take the industry’s side.”
Senator Pia Cayetano, one of the country’s prominent spokespersons on public health policy, said she was “embarrassed” that Filipino representatives appeared to advocate for the tobacco industry before a global forum.”
Cayetano, who headed the committee in the 19th Congress, strongly criticized the delegation for its support of the tobacco industry in a speech at the Senate after the conference ended in 2024, saying it was an “embarrassment that the representatives for us, for the Philippines, stood beside a global audience of mostly health advocates for the tobacco industry.”
Observers say the possible appointment of Gomez, his appearingly impressive credentials in the corporate environment notwithstanding, sends what critics call a “damaging signal” about the Marcos administration’s priorities.
Additionally, Gomez is not just being considered as a replacement for Ruiz, but potentially as a central messaging strategist for industry-aligned sectors – an unofficial “point person” for lobbying interests, including those of the tobacco industry.
This development, health groups chorus, is deeply disquieting.
Others called this “a textbook regulatory capture” – also known as “the economic theory of regulation” or simply “capture theory,” introduced to the world in the 1970s by the late George Stigler, a Nobel laureate economist at the University of Chicago.
Stigler noted that regulated industries maintain a keen and immediate interest in influencing regulators, whereas ordinary citizens are less motivated.
“You place a veteran industry executive in a strategic government post and suddenly the lines between public service and private interest become dangerously blurred.” Gomez’s long absence from journalism—he left the field more than 25 years ago—also raises practical questions.
Today’s media landscape is dominated by social media platforms, real-time public engagement, and a new generation of journalists, influencers, and digital-first communities.
His lack of familiarity with the current media ecosystem could result in outdated, out-of-touch communication strategies at a time when the administration needs to stay agile and responsive, according to media commentators.
