Key facts
- Antonio Tinio, an ACT Teachers party-list representative, accused the Marcos administration of displacing poor communities before the ASEAN summit.
- Tinio said vendors near Baclaran Church and beneath LRT Line 1 in Pasay were among those affected.
- Tinio said workers at small businesses such as Diwata Pares earn P500 a day and received no financial assistance.
- Tinio criticized artworks on barriers along summit routes, saying they conceal hunger and homelessness.
- Tinio called on the ASEAN National Organizing Council and Pasay and Parañaque governments to compensate affected workers.
Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jnr's administration has been accused of trying to conceal Manila's urban poverty by clearing street vendors and homeless people along key routes ahead of next week's Association of Southeast Asian Nations summit, according to a South China Morning Post report published on November 10, 2026.
Antonio Tinio, deputy minority floor leader of the House of Representatives representing the ACT Teachers Party List, claimed on Monday that authorities had launched operations to displace poor communities across the capital. The report does not give the date of his statement beyond the day of the week.
A Manila Times account of the same remarks, dated November 10, 2026, said Tinio accused the administration of reviving a practice he attributed to Imelda Marcos of concealing urban poverty from foreign visitors. He cited the clearing of vendors, street dwellers and small businesses along summit routes, and said urban poor communities in Pasay and Parañaque had been displaced to present what he called a sanitized Metro Manila to more than 10,000 foreign delegates.
Tinio said those affected included vendors near Baclaran Church and beneath LRT Line 1 in Pasay, and workers at small businesses such as Diwata Pares, whose employees he said earn P500 a day. He also cited reports that street dwellers near the Manila Film Center had been driven away ahead of the summit.
He criticized the use of artworks, including works by National Artists, on barriers along summit routes, saying art was being used to conceal hunger and homelessness rather than expose social realities. He said affected workers had received no financial assistance and had not been given a timeline for returning to their livelihoods.