A YouTube video is claiming that ACT Teachers Party-list Rep. France Castro has been removed from her position in the House of Representatives. This is false.
A YouTube channel published the spurious video that used numbers and special characters in its headline, in place of letters, to avoid keyword detection. It read:
“HETO GOODNEWS! P/NATALSEK nasa K0NGRES0 siCASTR0? SUMUG0D si ROBIN at VPSARA saKAMARA Lahat NADUWAG?
(This is good news! Castro has been kicked out of Congress? [Sen.] Robin Padilla and Vice President Sara Duterte rushed to Congress, everyone was terrified)”
No evidence was presented throughout the video’s 23-minute run to substantiate the erroneous claim. Instead, the video that was published last Nov. 26 showed a clip of someone giving a commentary on the possibility of Vice President Sara Duterte’s impeachment amid her threats to have President Ferdinand Marcos assassinated.
Contrary to the video’s claim, Castro remains in office and is still part of the House of Representatives’ roll of members.
While Sen. Robin Padilla did call on his peers in the Lower House to kick Castro out of Congress in a Nov. 25 Facebook post, there is currently no motion to expel or suspend her from the chamber.
According to the 1987 Constitution, an erring lawmaker may only be removed or suspended through a two-thirds vote from their fellow solons in the legislative chamber they belong to.
The video with the wrong claim came out after the House Committee on Good Government and Public Accountability approved Castro’s motion to extend the detention of Office of the Vice President chief of staff and undersecretary Zuleika Lopez to 10 days, citing alleged “evasive” behavior during the probe on the vice-president’s supposed misuse of confidential funds.
YouTube channel PINAS NEWS INSIDER (created on Dec. 26, 2015) published the video, garnering over 692,000 views and 26,000 online engagements.
