A July 23 Facebook post where former senator Antonio Trillanes IV claimed to have said the country lost “another productive senator” after he ended his stint as a legislator, is fabricated.
Facebook page Alon Calinao Dy, which posts mostly pro-Duterte content, uploaded a 2018 photo of Trillanes from the Senate website and added this concocted text: “Masakit man sa kalooban ko ang magpaalam, nanghihinayang lang ako, kasi nabawasan na naman ng isang productibong senador ang bansa (While it’s hard for me to say goodbye, I also regret it because the country just lost another productive senator).”
Trillanes did not give a farewell speech on the last day of his 12-year Senate term on June 30, and has made no such statement elsewhere. A cursory search of the fake quote did not yield anything that comes close, whether in official records, news articles, or even a June 6 video interview where the opposition senator was asked about the end of his term.
The fake quote card was published three days after Trillanes, a vocal critic of President Rodrigo Duterte’s policies, ended his term on June 30. The former Navy officer served two terms in the Senate, the first he won in 2007 while still in detention for coup charges.
The Alon Calinao Dy page has also been fact-checked by VERA Files Fact Check in July for posting a fabricated quote it attributed to Manila Mayor Francisco “Isko” Domagoso. (See: VERA FILES FACT CHECK: No, Isko DID NOT say he ‘doesn’t mind being a Duterte copycat’)
The page’s fake post could have reached over 2.4 million social media users. Top traffic generators of the post came from Facebook pages Alon Calinao Dy and Resign Leni Robredo Resign, and from a public Facebook group President Rody Duterte-Federal Movement International.
Alon Calinao Dy was created on January 2, 2014.
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