Netizens have resurfaced a 2022 news report about former president Rodrigo Duterte’s return to Davao City, falsely claiming that he had been released by the International Criminal Court.
Since Aug. 10, Facebook users have shared a two-minute, 27-second video from ONE PH‘s One Balita Pilipinas featuring broadcast journalist Cheryl Cosim reporting on Duterte’s return to his home city. The report also carried a clip of the former president being interviewed at the airport.
The news report carried the headline:
“DUTERTE, NAKAUWI NA SA DAVAO CITY (Duterte has come home to Davao City).”
Two FB posts on Aug. 10 and 11 bore the captions respectively:
“Yeheyyy nakauwi na si Tay digung (sic) sa Davao (Yehey. Tatay Digong is back home in Davao).”
“#Alhamdulillah nakaowe (sic) nadin (sic) sa wakas ang pag asa ng Pilipinas (Alhamdulillah, the hope of the Philippines has finally come home).”
These posts are false. The report was published in 2022 when Duterte returned to Davao City after his presidential term.
On July 1, 2022, One PH‘s official YouTube channel uploaded the news report about Duterte’s homecoming in Davao City, the night after he officially turned over the presidency to Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
Duterte remains detained at the International Criminal Court in The Hague as he awaits his trial set to open on Nov. 30.
Vice President Sara Duterte, in a July 28 interview outside the ICC detention facility in The Hague, also debunked claims that the former president will be freed this month, explaining that the ICC website itself shows that there are schedules for his upcoming trial but none for his release.
The old video was circulated with the wrong context four days after the former president’s common-law wife, Honeylet Avanceña, visited him at the Scheveningen prison for the first time in over a year — having previously been barred from visiting.
Since Duterte’s arrest in March last year, VERA Files has been debunking false claims about his supposed release from prison and return to the Philippines.
Four posts carrying the video with erroneous context uploaded by the FB page Sis Dang Vids (created on Dec. 30, 2023) and three other FB users collectively garnered 26,953 reactions; 2,783 comments; 4, 643 shares; and 852,000 views.
