Senator Leila de Lima has been the subject of several articles floating on social media about her allegedly saying that she plans to resign, but the Filipinos are stopping her from doing so. The articles were shared by Duterte and Marcos fan pages on Facebook.
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And the netizens did not hold back when they slammed the senator for claiming such a thing.
One of the articles shared was carried by newstrendph, which Meme Buster has listed as one of the sites peddling fake and satire articles online. One of the photos shared touting the said article even bore a quote from de Lima, who supposedly said: “Balak ko nga [mag-resign] eh, kaso kinakailangan pa nila ako..” The article was also carried by newsmediaph.
When we checked the article, we found a YouTube video of de Lima’s interview instead during the election campaign. She was interviewed on GMA’s News2Go by Howie Severino. However, the article was already talking about how de Lima won the election with over 14 million votes. It also noted how de Lima was reported to have said that being bashed online is unavoidable, especially after being linked to the illegal drug trade in the New Bilibid Prison.
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“Maraming bumatikos lalo na sa facebook. Pinag deny nya ito at naisipan pa daw nya mag reresign nalang bilang senador sa bansa pero hindi niya kayang bitawan na sa ganun-ganun nalang dahil marami pa daw ang nangangaylangan sa kanya lalo na sa kanyang mga bumuboto noong nakaraang eleksyon,” newstrendph wrote.
The inclusion of that YouTube video during the campaign period is irrelevant to the entire claim of the article about de Lima’s supposed plan to resign. Moreover, the article did not mention the quote on the photo that the senator allegedly uttered.
On August 20, de Lima denied President Rodrigo Duterte’s claims about her drug links and accused the current administration of trying to fabricate evidence against her. This was when she said she was “willing to resign” and be shot in front of Duterte if drug allegations against her are proven true.
But on August 29, de Lima expressed her resolve not to resign despite tirades against her because doing so “will be an admission of guilt and a sign of weakness.”
“Resignation at this point will be an admission of guilt and a sign of weakness. And I’m neither weak nor guilty,” de Lima said.
Her statement came after Duterte urged her to resign and said that if he were in her place, he would hang himself.
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Once again, on September 22, the senator rejected calls for her resignation, insisting that drug-related accusations against her were “senseless.”
This false article has actually surfaced before and we busted it, too. De Lima, is so far, not resigning or showing any signs of resigning from her post. In fact, she just hit back at Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre, saying that he has his position’s powers and government resources to “manufacture false evidence” to establish her links to drug trade.
Sources: (k2.abs-cbnnews.com, thestandard.com.ph, newsinfo.inquirer.net, gmanetwork.com)
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