A ‘flawless’ kind of issue
April 24, 2004 | 12:00am
In last Sunday’s (April 18) edition of The Buzz, Rosanna "Osang" Roces exploded a "bomb" right smack on the face of Dr. Vicki Belo who is (or used to be?) one of Rosanna’s good friends. Showbiz-watchers wondered, what happened?
Vicki cut short her extended Lenten family holiday in South Africa and came home to answer Rosanna’s accusations point by point. Here they are (without further comment from yours truly):
Issue No. 1: Osang says I am not a real doctor and am just an aerobics instructor
These are the facts :
1. I received a medical degree from UST in 1985
2. I passed Medical Licensure Exams in 1987
3. I received a diploma in dermatology in Bangkok in 1990
4. I trained with the inventor Tumescent Liposuction Dr. Jeffrey Klein in California
5. I am an officer of the Philippine Liposuction Society
6. I am also a member of the American Society of Liposuction Surgery and have been invited to speak at their national conventions several times, the last time being in Michigan.
I do admit that I taught aerobics for 12 years. It was a wonderful way of keeping fit and earning money while still in medical school. I also believe that it helped me become a better liposuction surgeon because teaching aerobics daily for 12 years made me appreciate the human form so much better.
Issue No. 2: She claims that I was a nobody when she had her liposuction with me and that she "made me."
The first time I met Osang was in 1997, when she came to have a liposuction done. The reason she came to me in the first place was because I had already established a good reputation doing liposuction. She paid for her lipo in full, minus a 10 percent discount. The first area I suctioned was the abdominal area, waist and hips. Soon after, she started thanking me for the procedure on radio and on television. I was so grateful that I sought her out to thank her. This was the beginning of our friendship. Although I admit that Osang really helped me garner more acclaim it was a symbiotic relationship since I made her sexier while our careers flourished simultaneously.
Issue No. 3: She is unhappy with her liposuction.
When we were friends, she kept raving about her liposuction and praising me weekly on TV for the last six years. Only now, when she has a personal grudge against me, does she suddenly claim the liposuction was defective. Osang had four liposuction sessions with me. The first was her abdominal area, the second on the thighs, third on her arms and fourth on her back. The sessions took place over the course of the next few years. If she was truly unhappy, why did she trust her "puhunan" (her face and body) repeatedly in my hands? Why did she refer her friends to me? She was not a paid endorser and there was no contract so she could have gone elsewhere. And after our liposuction, she would don very revealing outfits to flaunt her body.
Liposuction is a procedure that removes fat. To look good a patient must maintain his or her ideal weight and exercise. It is not the surgeon’s fault if the patient gains a lot weight and looks fat again afterwards. Also, if there really were any "bukol-bukol," why did she not complain about it then or even say something a year ago when our friendship first began to collapse? Why is she only mentioning it now? I truly believe that Osang is allowing herself to be used by people who will benefit from all this brouhaha, while getting loads of media mileage.
Issue No. 4: She claims that I am a doctor that is all HYPE and that I have no substance.
I started appearing on television in 1992. Since then, the thrust in all my appearances was to educate Filipinos about new cosmetic procedures. While hype can make one famous, it is not enough to sustain a career. I have been in practice for 14 years, during which my patients are happily coming back and my practice continues to grow.
Issue No. 5: Flawless. She put in P2 million; she never got any money back, "kahit singko."
When a patient of mine approached me with the idea of opening a low end, facial center, I told her I was busy with my clinics but that I would give her the perfect partner who was Osang. I really thought this would be a good opportunity for her so she would have a business when she was not busy with her showbiz career.
I convinced her partner to make Osang an industrial partner. In a meeting, Osang agreed that in exchange for a 20 percent share in Forever Flawless, she would promote Forever Flawless during her TV appearances and pledged to visit one clinic at least once a week. Osang never put any money into Flawless – "kahit singko," in her own words. She also failed to completely fulfill her part of the bargain. While she did promote Flawless on her TV appearances, she only visited Flawless Megamall twice in the span of three years and never even set foot in the Northmall and Bicutan branches. I do not own any shares in Flawless; I am merely a consultant.
According to papers her partners presented to me, Osang received P200,000 during the first year of operation. Osang was very unhappy with the amount. I tried explaining to her that the money was being ploughed back into the business. After all, they went from one branch in Megamall to a bigger branch in Northmall, a branch in Bicutan and then an expansion of Megamall. That’s where all the profits were going. She couldn’t comprehend this.
In her simple logic Flawless was expanding and therefore she should be getting lots of money. I told her that the books were wide open and that she should bring an accountant and a business person to examine them so everything would be clear. On the other hand, I was getting pahiya to her partners who were complaining that she was not living up to her end of the bargain which was to visit one clinic a week.
Osang never asked to get out of the partnership; they offered to buy her out because they grew tired of her lack of professionalism. It was a very generous offer, too, since she never put up any capital nor did she fulfill her part of the agreement. Another reason for Osang’s being unhappy was because her demand to make her husband the manager of Flawless was denied. The partners decided instead to hire a professional and experienced manager.
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