A video of Vice President Leni Robredo warning to stock up on foodstuffs should President Rodrigo Duterte declare martial law to place the country under total lockdown is fake. The female voice in the audio is not Robredo’s.
The original video showing Robredo talking behind a face mask is spliced with audio of an unidentified woman’s voice.
The fake video was uploaded by Facebook (FB) page Sunade with the caption: “MaMa LEni Nyo Nagkakalat na ng FAKENEWS. Ito ba ang gusto nyo Leader mukhang DESPERADA na ah? #thevoice (Leni’s spreading fake news. Is this the leader you want? She looks desperate.)”
The voice message surfaced a few days after the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) placed several cities and provinces in the country under Alert Level 3 following the recent surge in COVID-19 cases.
In a statement to reporters, Defense Secretary Delfin Lorenzana said there is no “compelling reason” to place the country under martial law, further labeling the audio message spreading on messaging platforms as “fake news” and “not true.”
Malacañang also refuted the circulating audio clip.
“While we were having our cabinet meeting, a voice clip of a woman spread around yesterday, saying there will be a total lockdown and martial law. This is fake news,” Acting Presidential Spokesperson Karlo Nograles said in Filipino during a press briefing on Jan. 7.
The original video was from a 2020 video footage published on Robredo’s official FB page during the devastation of Typhoon Ulysses in Cagayan Province.
The altered video’s online release came just as Robredo announced the revival of her office’s Swab Cab free antigen testing following the alarming increase in COVID-19 cases.
The video has been viewed more than 69,000 times and garnered more than 1,600 reactions, 1,400 comments, and 326 shares. Sunade was created on Oct. 22, 2015.
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(Editor’s Note: VERA Files has partnered with Facebook to fight the spread of disinformation. Find out more about this partnership and our methodology.)
