SONA 2019 Promise Tracker: Foreign Relations
The rising tensions with China in the West Philippine Sea hogged President Rodrigo Duterte’s fourth state of the nation address in 2019, where he promised two things that remain hanging to this day:
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SONA 2019 Promise Tracker: Drugs and Crime
Expressing disappointment over his failure to deliver on a campaign promise to end the drug menace, President Rodrigo Duterte repeated in his 2019 SONA his request to Congress to pass a bill restoring the death penalty on drug-related crimes and plunder.
VERA FILES FACT SHEET: What’s next for ABS-CBN after losing franchise bid?
For the second time since 1972, the government shut down broadcast network ABS-CBN, displacing more than 11,000 workers at a time the country is grappling with the coronavirus disease (COVID-19) pandemic that is taking a heavy toll on the economy.
VERA FILES FACT SHEET: The issue over ABS-CBN’s blocktime agreement
After the committee on legislative franchises of the House of Representatives rejected ABS-CBN’s bid for a new 25-year franchise, some lawmakers still wanted an investigation of the network’s blocktime agreement with AMCARA Broadcasting Network.
VERA FILES FACT CHECK: Badoy red-tags nun; incorrectly labels NDF a terror group, again
Communications Undersecretary Lorraine Marie Badoy repeated a wrong claim when she said the National Democratic Front (NDF) of the Philippines is a terrorist group while linking activist Sr. Mary John Mananzan to the organization.
VERA FILES FACT CHECK: Pending enactment of anti-terror bill, Locsin repeats false claim that drug ops vs. terrorist leader caused Marawi siege
For at least the third time, Foreign Affairs Secretary Teodoro “Teddy Boy” Locsin Jr. falsely claimed that the serving of a warrant of arrest for illegal drugs triggered the Marawi siege.
FACT CHECK: Duterte changes tune on terminating PH-US VFA
From stressing that the Philippines “did not need” the United States to “survive as a nation,” President Rodrigo Duterte, through his foreign affairs secretary, is now citing “political and other developments in the region” to delay by at least six months the termination of the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFA).
VERA FILES FACT CHECK: Panelo, Duterte’s outlandish martial law justifications
Martial law has been a part of President Rodrigo Duterte’s vocabulary since he assumed power in 2016, and Chief Presidential Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo appears to share this fascination.
FACT CHECK: NTC backpedals on ABS-CBN franchise
The National Telecommunications Commission did a 180-degree turn when it issued a cease and desist order against media network ABS-CBN from continuing its broadcast operations beyond the expiration of its franchise on May 4.
VERA FILES FACT CHECK: Lorenzana contradicts military statement on China gun-pointing incident in West PH Sea
Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana has downplayed the Feb. 17 incident in which a Chinese warship aimed a radar gun on a Philippine navy ship within Philippine waters, contradicting an earlier statement of the military.
