Mandatory conference tackles ‘Ryzza Mae Dizon Matter’

MANILA, Philippines – The Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB) held its mandatory conference on Thursday, September 5, to take up “the Ryzza Mae Dizon Matter,” as the board described in its statement the controversy over the recent treatment of the 8-year-old child star on live television.

READ: MTRCB sounds off for Ryzza Mae 

Executives of GMA-7 and Tape Inc. attended the conference called by the board to clarify the “allegedly insensitive and unfriendly” treatment of the child star-host in the GMA programs “Eat Bulaga!” and “The Ryzza Mae Show,” both produced by Tape Inc.

Comedian-host Vic Sotto of “Eat Bulaga!” and Gelsa Buhok, a guest in the August 14 episode of “The Ryzza Mae Show,” have drawn flak among netizens in the wake of the disputed episodes.

But a producer of “Eat Bulaga!” notes Sotto’s “soft spot” for Dizon, even helping finance the purchase of a house for her family, as veteran showbiz manager and writer Ethel Ramos recently wrote in Malaya.

“Appearing today before the MTRCB’s Ad Hoc Committee on the Ryzza Mae Dizon Matter, TAPE, Inc. and GMA Network acknowledged lapses in the scenes in question and agreed to enter into a 3-month period of closer collaboration with the MTRCB to ensure child-friendly scenes involving child host Ryzza Mae Dizon,” the board said in a statement issued Thursday. 

GMA and Tape were given until September 9 “to submit concrete and time-bound remedial measures” to ensure that Dizon’s “dignity and well-being as a child are not violated,” the statement said.

On Twitter, the board thanked the executives “for their cooperation @ this afternoon’s proceedings,” and acknowledged the “inputs” of child psychiatrist Vanessa Cainghug of the Philippine Psychiatric Association in “ensuring psych well-being of child host Ryzza Mae.” – Rappler.com