Wowowee Willyonaryo controversy

The "Wowowee" Wilyonaryo controversy is a series of events that began on the August 20, 2007 episode of ABS-CBN's noontime game show "Wowowee", when a controversial error occurred during the final jackpot round of the game show's second major game "Willyonaryo", which raised allegations that the game could be rigged.

Development

During the episode, a contestant named Weng participated in the Willyonaryo portion of the show. In the earlier rounds, she won PHP37,000. For the jackpot portion of the game, she was drawn with a white wheel (out of the 12 wheels used in this game). Weng now had to choose between two big prizes: the P100,000 that the host Willie Revillame was offering her, or whatever was in the window of the white wheel, which, according to the rules, could be a jackpot prize of P2,000,000 (US$45,000), a jackpot prize of P1,000,000 (US$22,500), a jackpot prize of P500,000 (US$11,250), a house and lot, or nothing at all (which would be signified by the numeral zero). cite news | title =ABS-CBN: No cheating in 'Wowowee' game | publisher = ABS-CBNNews.com (owned by ABS-CBN, the same TV network which produces and airs Wowowee) | date = 29 August 2007 | url = http://www.abs-cbnnews.com/storypage.aspx?StoryID=90360 ]

At first, Weng chose to go with what was inside the white wheel. However, after being prodded by the hosts to take the money instead, she changed her mind and decided to forgo the possible jackpot prize revealed in the white wheel and instead take home the P100,000 for this round, plus the P37,000 from the earlier round. After this, Willie pulled the dark film from the window to reveal what prize Weng had lost by choosing to take home the P137,000. Pulling the dark film revealed the numeral zero. This meant that if she had chosen the white wheel instead, she would have gone home with only P37,000.

After the decision, Willie went on to reveal where the jackpot prizes—the P2,000,000 cash prize, the P1,000,000 cash prize, the P500,000 cash prize, and the house and lot—were hidden. He said that the symbol for the P2,000,000 cash prize--the numeral "2"--was in the window of the violet wheel. He was handed the violet wheel, and he reached behind the wheel, supposedly to pull the dark film in order to reveal the numeral "2." However, when he pulled the film, the numeral "0" appeared instead. He appeared to fiddle with the back of the wheel and then he pulled out two films: one dark film (supposedly the "cover" film) and another film with the numeral "2" printed on it. As he held those two films in his hand, the numeral "0" was still visible in the window of the violet wheel.

Willie went on to reveal which wheels contained the films for the other prizes. However, after the show aired, controversy erupted as many viewers (whether of the original show or of clips uploaded later on to YouTube and other video sharing sites), asked whether the mistake was a sign that the show—or at least this portion of the show—could be or was rigged.

Reactions and criticisms

The controversy grew after Joey de Leon, one of the hosts of "Eat Bulaga!", a competing show aired by the GMA Network, made remarks daily on the rival show and his own weekend talk show after the incident, and ended a tongue-in-cheek newspaper column with the words, "Teasing is not bad. Cheating is ... on television."cite news | title =Joey: Puso mahirap palitan, pamilya pwedeng dagdagan | publisher = GMANews.tv | date = 29 August 2007 | url = http://www.gmanews.tv/story/58242/Joey-de-Leon-Teasing-is-not-bad-Cheating-is-on-TV ] Many readers interpreted this line to be a reference to Wowowee. On the August 29, 2007 episode of "Wowowee", Willie Revillame emotionally addressed Joey de Leon and insisted that he had not been cheating and then went on to say "Hindi po ako nandadaya... 'Wag n'yo paglaruan pagkatao ko. Kayo na bida. Sa'yo na" ratings. "Sige" 'Eat Bulaga' "na" No. 1 (I do not cheat... Don't insult me. You can have the fame, the ratings. Fine, 'Eat Bulaga' is No. 1!)". Joey retaliated Willie's statement the following day by advising his rival to "Explain before you complain" in a 10-minute speech made on "Eat Bulaga".

On August 30, 2007, Senator Mar Roxas, chair of the Senate trade and commerce committee, announced that he will propose an inquiry into this alleged game rigging after getting information from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) and concerned parties (after Joey de Leon jokingly called upon lawmakers to conduct a probe). The incident was nicknamed the "Hello Pappy Scandal", a reference to Willie's nickname "Pappy", and the Hello Garci scandal.cite news | title=Roxas seeks probe on 'Hello, Pappy' game show 'scam' | publisher = GMA NEWS.TV | date = 30 August 2007 | url=http://www.gmanews.tv/story/58395/Roxas-seeks-probe-on-Hello-Pappy-game-show-scam] The game was later replaced by Merrygalo in October the same year.

Rehearsal videos

On December 20, 2007, Joey de Leon pointed his viewers toward a video on YouTube, showing a rehearsal session for Wilyonaryo. The rehearsal depicted several "scenarios" for how the game could end using two numbers (a "5", which symbolized for P500,000; and "0") inside a single wheel, thus suggesting the possibilities that the hosts and production staff knew how the game would end.

References

See also

* Wowowee
* ABS-CBN