Cagayan de Oro Rep. Lordan Suan has once again become the target of a disinformation campaign, with posts claiming he threatened to file a “shoot-to-kill” resolution against fugitive Sen. Ronald “Bato” dela Rosa, who remains in hiding amid a standing International Criminal Court arrest warrant. The lawmaker has disowned the fake quote.
First published by a Facebook page posing as a news outlet on Oct. 31, the graphic bore images of Suan and dela Rosa along with a statement attributed to the former:
“If Bato Dela Rosa fails to surrender by the deadline, I will convene a House committee hearing and file a shoot-to-k*ll resolution.”
In a Nov. 2 statement on his official FB page, Suan debunked the “FALSE, FAKE, FABRICATED” online claim, saying he “never made that statement.”
The Mindanaoan legislator added he “[stands] firmly for due process and the rule of law.”
Suan chairs the Committee on Public Information, not the Committee on Foreign Affairs, which has jurisdiction over the Philippines’ relations with other international organizations and agencies, like the ICC that issued an arrest warrant against dela Rosa last November 2025 for charges of crimes against humanity due to his role as chief enforcer of former president Rodrigo Duterte’s deadly drug war.
House resolutions allow lawmakers to express the chamber’s opinion or urge congressional action on current issues affecting national interest. However, they are not referred to the president for signature and carry no force of law.
In 2023, the House Committee on Justice and the Committee on Human Rights adopted a resolution urging the Philippine government to cooperate with the ICC’s investigation into the country’s war on drugs.
Suan, also a member of the House prosecution panel in the impeachment trial of Vice President Sara Duterte, has been the subject of false online claims that VERA Files previously fact-checked, including fabricated remarks proposing a ban on Duterte supporters from entering Cagayan de Oro.
The recent bogus posts about the congressman surfaced a day after the one-week deadline for dela Rosa’s surrender expired on Oct. 30.
Authorities have intensified their nationwide manhunt operations, with the Philippine National Police forming dedicated tracker teams in all regions to locate dela Rosa, who has been at large since May 2026. Meanwhile, the Department of Interior and Local Government has since offered a P50-million bounty for information leading to the senator’s arrest.
At least 22 posts carrying the manufactured quote of Suan, including by FB pages News Online PH (created on June 24, 2026 as Oro News Online), State News Online (July 12, 2020) and News Stories (Nov. 1, 2019), have so far garnered 106,856 reactions; 40,090 comments and 4,175 shares.
