The Voice Behind the Podium

A podium reveals a speaker and conceals a great deal. The public hears the answer; it rarely sees the hours spent preparing it, the judgment behind a carefully chosen phrase, or the effort required to remain composed when a question carries an accusation.

At the Rotary Club of Manila's 14th Weekly Membership Meeting on October 15, 2026, at Fairmont Makati, Atty. Claire Castro brought some of that unseen work into view. The Presidential Communications Office Undersecretary and Palace Press Officer spoke with the assurance familiar to viewers of Palace briefings, but also with the humor, personal recollections, and candor that a fellowship gathering makes possible.

Her subject, "Behind the Podium: Combating Misinformation, Communicating with Trust," found a receptive setting in a club whose members regularly ask themselves whether what they say and do is truthful, fair, and beneficial. Over the course of her address and the conversation that followed, those familiar questions acquired the immediacy of a message waiting to be forwarded or a headline about to be believed.

The afternoon also gave service a concrete undertaking. Rotary Club of Manila marked its role as the lead local club in the PHILIPPINE ROTARY WATER WARRIORS initiative through the signing of a Memorandum of Understanding on sustainable community water and sanitation systems. Alongside a discussion about the information people depend upon came a commitment to another daily necessity: safe water.

Introduced by Immediate Past President Raoul C. Creencia, Atty. Claire arrived with experience drawn from courtrooms, broadcast studios, and digital platforms. Each had prepared her for aspects of public communication. None, her recollections suggested, could entirely soften the sudden exposure of becoming a voice of the Presidency.

The appointment had not been a cherished ambition. She recalled being asked to help the country, then finding herself facing questions almost immediately after taking her oath. There was little room for a gentle introduction. The microphone was already hers.

Her response was to prepare, to study the issues, know the basis of her answers, and make sure she could stand behind what she said. For Atty. Claire, evidence gives a public statement its footing. In a political climate crowded with competing claims, she believes a communicator must be able to show why an assertion deserves belief. Her habit of bringing supporting material to briefings has earned her the nickname "Visual Aids Queen." She treats the label with amusement, while taking the practice behind it seriously.

Documents and other supporting material give journalists something to examine. They also make the speaker answerable for her own words. Her confidence at the podium, she explained, rests on having done that work beforehand. It is an approach shaped by her years as a trial lawyer, where conviction must be supported by a basis that can withstand challenge. Broadcasting added another discipline: making complicated matters understandable to people listening from very different circumstances.

Yet the Palace podium imposes demands of its own. Atty. Claire acknowledged that she is naturally fond of jokes and of making difficult subjects feel lighter. In her official role, that instinct must pass through a careful awareness of whom she represents. A phrase spoken casually elsewhere may carry a different weight when delivered for the President. Even when she feels strongly about criticism directed at the administration, diplomacy remains part of her responsibility. Members accustomed to seeing only the finished response heard something of the restraint involved in producing it.

The spirited personality behind that restraint was never far away.

"Ante Kler," the social media rendering of "Auntie Claire," has circulated in commentary about her outspoken defense of President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and her sharp exchanges with administration critics. Atty. Claire has met the nickname with humor and made room for it in her public persona.

At the Rotary Club of Manila, she recalled the President himself calling her "Auntie Claire" during a media exchange in Singapore. That, she joked, made it official. The audience, too, could call her Auntie Claire. The story offered a small illustration of how she handles the pressures surrounding her work. She does not give every hostile remark the power to interrupt her day. To follow each insult, she explained, would be to lose her bearings amid the noise. She keeps her attention on the task.

There was a quieter source of steadiness as well. Speaking of the effort she brings to her duties, Atty. Claire turned to faith and to a lesson she shares with her

children: do the best work you can, with the thought that you are offering it to God. She spoke of praying for strength, wisdom, and courage. In that moment, the discussion moved beyond communication technique into the private convictions that sustain a public life. Preparation might supply the answer; faith helps her face the next question.

Her account of government service also drew on meetings the public does not see. She described hearing President Marcos urge agencies to pursue lawful measures that would benefit people, even when those decisions might attract criticism. These encounters, she said, shape her understanding of his priorities and his commitment to nation building. Presented as her own observations, the recollections gave members a glimpse of the experiences behind the positions she explains in public. They also brought the afternoon back to a recurring concern: the people whom government decisions are meant to serve. That concern extended to her appeal against misinformation. The reach of modern technology, she observed, has brought information into nearly every hand while allowing falsehoods to travel with extraordinary ease. A claim can move through families, friendships, and communities before anyone stops to ask where it began.

Atty. Claire invited Rotarians to place The Four-Way Test at precisely that point of decision.

Before sharing, ask whether the information is true. Consider its fairness, its effect on relationships, and the good it may do. Applied to a phone screen, Rotary's ethical questions become practical habits of attention.

She affirmed the place of dissent in public life while emphasizing the responsibility to preserve facts. Her larger hope was for a culture of discernment, with people willing to pause, examine, and think before giving a claim another audience.

The fellowship around her message gave it a personable setting. She acknowledged familiar faces, recalled her beginnings in broadcasting, and warmly praised the club's chorale. Humor moved easily through the exchange, allowing members to encounter both the official accustomed to difficult questions and the woman who could laugh at her own stories.

The Water Warriors signing carried the afternoon's concern for service beyond the ballroom.

The Memorandum of Understanding brought together the Rotary Club of Los Angeles, known as LA5, the Rotary Club of Manila, and the RCManila Foundation in a framework for cooperation on community water and sanitation systems. For the Rotary Club of Manila, its position as lead local club entails the patient work through which a humanitarian undertaking becomes useful: assessing sites, bringing communities into the process, mobilizing volunteers, and coordinating installation and continuing operation.

LA5 will contribute catalytic funding and international collaboration, while the RCManila Foundation will provide financial oversight for Phase One funds. The initial phase envisions three demonstration community water systems, with another site subject to qualification. Identified locations include schools in Imus, Cavite, and Bulacan, and a remote Indigenous village. Locally manufactured reverse-osmosis filtration systems will form part of an approach that also considers training, maintenance, community management, and long-term operation. The distinction matters in the lives of the intended beneficiaries. A system must continue to function after installation day. Someone must understand its upkeep, monitor its operation, and accept responsibility for its care.

Successful demonstration projects could support a Rotary Foundation Global Grant application for approximately 40 additional systems, subject to funding and approval. That possibility gives the first installations a further purpose: to establish results and lessons on which a wider undertaking can responsibly be built.

At Fairmont Makati, signatures set that work in motion, just as Atty. Claire's words left members with something to practice in their own daily exchanges. The next forwarded message would offer one opportunity. The next community visit would offer another.

Beyond the podium and beyond the signing table lay the continuing work of earning trust through an answer supported by evidence, a promise attended to, and water flowing where it is needed.