A video allegedly showing Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos inhaling a white powder has been denounced as “fake” and “malicious”, with investigators presenting close-up images of his ear to prove it was not him.
The clip featuring a dark-haired man was part of a video shown at a rally in Los Angeles that was organised by a political group linked to Marcos’s predecessor Rodrigo Duterte.
The rally was livestreamed on the Facebook page of pro-Duterte broadcaster SMNI, hours before Marcos was due to deliver his annual State of the Nation address to Congress.
“It is obvious from the video that that is not our president. Their video is fake and obviously not real,” Defence Secretary Gilberto Teodoro said Monday, after the video went viral on social media.
Teodoro said it was part of a “serious plan to destabilise our government”.
Duterte’s former spokesman Harry Roque shared it on his Facebook page with a caption in Tagalog reading: “You be the judge”.
Police forensic experts held a news conference on Tuesday to prove the man in the video was not the president, presenting photos of Marcos and the unidentified man for comparison.
Enlarged images of their faces and right ears were placed side by side to demonstrate that Marcos’s ear was larger in proportion to his face and had a different shape to those of the other man, whose ear curled over at the top.
“Be it AI (artificial intelligence) or imposter or whatever it was, as far as the (police) is concerned that is not the president,” Interior Secretary Benjamin Abalos said Tuesday.
The Marcos and Duterte families have had a bitter, public falling out as they attempt to shore up their rival support bases and secure key positions ahead of the 2025 mid-term elections. — AFP
