Vice President and presidential aspirant Leni Robredo recently debunked two doctored Facebook posts she claimed were posted against her and her supporters.
The public official on Sunday tagged the posts as “fake news” and slammed the bad editing of the uploader.
“Radical magmahal lalo na ‘pag Linggo. Pero fake news ito at ang sama ng pagka-photoshop,” she wrote on the social networking platform, referencing a famous image editing program.
“Obviously done to put us in a bad light. Hindi po tayo magpapatinag. Let us report posts like these,” Robredo added.
The first picture was shared by a supporter of another presidential aspirant, former senator Ferdinand Marcos Jr.
“Caravan ni Ma’am Leni Dinumog,” the uploader wrote on November 29, referring to an alleged caravan supposedly staged by supporters of Robredo. The post was accompanied by smiling face emojis.
According to VERA Files, one of the fact-checkers previously tapped by the social networking platform, the original photo shows “devotees of the Black Nazarene crossing the Jones Bridge in Manila on Jan. 9, 2018.”
The photo was sourced from Ailyn Shi and posted on the pages of ABS-CBN and GMA News.
At that time, Catholic devotees were participating in Traslacion which commemorates the transfer of the image of the Black Nazarene from Intramuros to the Minor Basilica in Quiapo. The image is deemed miraculous by its believers.
Days after the post was called out, the uploader edited the altered Traslacion photo to add the caption, enclosed in quotation marks: “Obvious na fake news po ito.”
The false post has already been tagged by Facebook as an “altered photo.”
“Independent fact-checkers say this information could mislead people,” it said.
Meanwhile, the other edited picture that the vice president has flagged showed a wet market vendor whose face was digitally manipulated to wrongfully feature Robredo as the seller.
The post appeared to be deleted on Facebook but reported screenshots of it showed a critic calling Robredo out and accusing her of being full of “optics.”
“Tumatakbo ka ng presidente. Trabaho ba ‘yan ng presidente? Magtinda ng isda? Mangingisda ba ang tatay mo? Ano ‘yan, puro optics na lang?” part of the alleged caption reads.
A reverse image search on the wet market photo showed that it was originally linked to GMA Network’s “Balitambayan” report in 2019. The picture was a thumbnail used for the article and it featured an unidentified fish seller.