Marikina LGU to sue supplier over inverted PH flag shown at Palarong Pambansa drone show

The Marikina City government said Sunday it would file a case against a drone systems operator and provider for displaying the Philippine flag with interchanged colors in a drone show during the closing ceremony of the 2023 Palarong Pambansa.

In a statement, the local government unit (LGU) of Marikina City—the host for this year’s Palarong Pambansa—explained that part of the games’ closing program on Saturday held at the Marikina Sports Center was the drone show from the city's supplier, DroneTech Philippines.

The LGU said there was a mistake in the formation of the Philippine flag in the drone show where the color red was on top and blue was on the bottom.

“Mariing kinondena ng Marikina City Government sa pangunguna ni Mayor Marcy Teodoro ang pangyayari at pinapakasuhan ang Dronetech ph upang madetermina ang mga legal na pananagutan ng kumpanya kasama na rin ang mga kalakip na kaparusahan at multa,” it said.

(The Marikina City Government, led by Mayor Marcy Teodoro, strongly condemns the incident and will sue Dronetech PH to determine the company's legal responsibilities, including the accompanying penalties and fines.)

For its part, DroneTech apologized for the “grave error,” attributing the mistake to the inclement weather and the signal interference in the area.

“We would like to clarify that this error in the Drone Show programming which was supposed to be tested days before could have been noticed and corrected [but] was not successfully done due to severe weather conditions and signal interference on the said area for several nights,” it said.

READ: Humingi na ng public apology ang Drone Tech dahil sa pagkakabaligtad ng watawat ng Pilipinas sa kanilang drone show sa Palarog Pambansa sa Marikina City @dzbb pic.twitter.com/iUHpXjqML9

— Luisito Santos (@luisitosantos03) August 5, 2023

DroneTech also said that it had “no malice or bad intentions on anyone and the people of Marikina and the Philippines as a whole” for committing the error.

“Moving forward we will make sure to execute proper protocols in testing our future shows. The company is sincerely sorry for this unintentional error in programming,” it added.

According to the law, during times of peace, when the flag is raised in horizontal position, the blue field of the flag should be above the red field.

Three years after COVID-19 hit the country, the annual Palarong Pambansa, the multi-sport event of student-athletes from 17 regions, resumed on Monday, July 31.

The competition ended August 5. —Giselle Ombay/KG, GMA Integrated News