President Rodrigo Roa Duterte thinks that the red cauldron which is at the center of nasty political talk about the Southeast Asian Games is an intellectual product, which value is subject to the whims of the artist who made it. This means that the artist whom Duterte and Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano cited has been long dead before the cauldron was made.
Duterte reacted after Senate Minority leader Franklin Drilon noted the alleged high price of the cauldron which government bought for 45 million pesos (this is the figure used by Speaker Alan Peter Cayetano in his interview over DZMM-Teleradyo over “Dos for Dos”)
As a product of the mind, as what Duterte described it, the value of the cauldron depends on the artist who was commissioned to make it. Therefore, if the artist says his work of art is 45 million pesos in value, then it is the value.
Francisco “Bobby” Manosa was the artist described by Duterte and Cayetano as the one who made the controversial cauldron.
Manosa has been long dead. He died last February 20, 2019 at the age of 88.
