President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has pitched for the inclusion of three of the country's sites into the ongoing search for the New Seven Wonders of the World. Arroyo said she visited the Tubbataha Reef in Palawan to campaign for the site, which as of Friday was number seven among the 77 candidates ranked through Internet-based voting.
She said she would return to Tubbataha after her actvities in Negros Oriental.
Arroyo took a break from work Thursday and went diving in the popular diving spot.
"We need all Filipinos who are working here and abroad to vote," Arroyo said in an interview with the local media in Negros Oriental, which was aired Friday over government station Radyo ng Bayan.
Aside from the Tubbataha Reef, Arroyo also campaigned for Chocolate Hills in Bohol and the underground river in Palawan, which she said were ranked ninth and 20th respectively.
In the website www.new7wonders.com, however, Tubbataha Reef is the only Philippine site in the top 77 as of April 25.
The site said that the vote is on until Dec. 31, 2008, after which the top 77 nominees would be submitted to a panel of experts that would put together a shortlist of 21 finalists by January 2009.
A second round of popular voting for the 21 finalists will then ensue and last until the end of 2009 -- with the top seven nominees being officially declared the "New Seven Wonders of the World" by the year 2010, it said.
The search is organized by the Unesco (United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization) and the non-profit New Seven Wonders Foundation, which also undertook the "New Seven Wonders of the World" search that ended last year.
