‘Opposition Senate bet not claiming credit for Manila Bay cleanup’

MANILA, Philippines – A social media post showing an election campaign material of Senator Bam Aquino supposedly claiming credit for the cleanup of Manila Bay is false, a foreign news agency said on Friday.

https://www.facebook.com/197379271170935/photos/a.197382197837309/237489317159930/?type=3

The Agence France Presse (AFP) debunked a circulating Facebook post showing Aquino taking credit for the rehabilitation and cleanup of Manila Bay, which has been shared more than 2,000 times.

AFP said the image has been “doctored from an original campaign poster which said Aquino was the author of a bill reducing the price of fuel.”

Upon conducting a reverse-image search, the photo was traced back to a Twitter post dated Oct. 18, 2018 with a hashtag #bam2019.

The tweet contained a series of campaign posters with the #SupportBam hashtag.

The text on the original photo read:  “Reduced price of fuel. Sen. Bam Aquino is fighting for this. Sen. Bam Aquino. Author of the Lower Price Bill. #Support Bam.”

The AFP said that a search of Aquino’s Facebook and Instagram account also revealed no campaign material on the Manila Bay cleanup drive.

The AFP also said that a spokesperson from Aquino’s office told the news agency that they had not produced or issued the campaign material in which Aquino supposedly claimed credit for the Manila Bay cleanup drive.

“No. It was an edited version of one of our official posters that we released last October 2018. Here is the link of our original poster for your reference. As you can see, they’ve used the same layout and photo, but changed the text,” Nicco Atos, Aquino’s media relations officer told AFP in a February 1, 2019 email./gsg