Leni Robredo on hateful attack vs daughter Aika: Stay focused, fight it with truth

Vice President Leni Robredo. FILE PHOTO

MANILA, Philippines — Vice President Leni Robredo on Monday rallied supporters to “not lose focus” and fight the latest attack on her family with the truth.

Links to an alleged sex video of her daughter Aika were circulating on social media – which Robredo’s camp branded as a “malicious fabrication” as it is an obvious ploy to distract supporters of the Vice President, who is running for president in the May 9 polls.

Atty. Barry Gutierrez, spokesperson of Robredo said their “lawyers are studying our options for legal action.” He also said that they have reported the links to the platforms concerned so all of those would be taken down.

“Best antidote to fake news is the TRUTH. Let us not lose focus. Tuloy-tuloy lang ang paggawa ng kabutihan. This was how I survived the last 6 years,” Robredo said in a Twitter post.

Guiterrez, meanwhile, said in a statement: “Our supporters should see this for what it is: A distraction. This is a direct and vile response to the momentum we continue to gain. It won’t yield votes for those who are spreading it.”

He pointed out that the ultimate goal of the hateful attack on Robredo’s family was to annoy supporters and make them lose sight of their utmost goal: Robredo’s victory.

“Ang mas malalim na goal ng ganitong tactic, ‘yung manggigil tayo at magwala sa social media. Para awayin natin ang mga tao at hindi tayo maka-convert. Kaya nga ang tamang response dito: Hold the line tayo para sa pag-ibig. Be firm but kind sa pagtatama ng disinformation, kahit gaano ito kawalanghiya,” he said.

“Malinaw na krimen ito. At ang paraan para talunin ang mga ganito once and for all: Manalo tayo sa halalan, ayusin ang sistema, at panagutin ang mga nagkakalat nito,” he added.

Robredo and Gutierrez did not specifically cite a link but some netizens posted links that supposedly direct a user to a lewd video of Aika Robredo.

By late afternoon on Monday, INQUIRER.net tried to click the links but such a video does not exist.  Instead, the links would redirect to questionable advertisement pop-up pages.

Robredo and her family have been victims of disinformation many times in the past, even before the Vice President announced her candidacy for president in the 2022 elections.  In 2020, a Facebook account was discovered to be masquerading as Robredo’s second daughter Tricia Robredo, using the latter’s display photos while sending hateful messages to other people.

Just recently, fact-checker Tsek.ph said that Robredo is the biggest victim of negative misinformation, while her opponent in the 2016 vice presidential polls and in the upcoming 2022 national elections, Bongbong Marcos, is the beneficiary of positive but misleading messages on social media.

READ: Robredo is biggest disinformation victim; Marcos gains from ‘misleading’ posts — fact-checker 

This prompted Robredo to firmly ask the public to fight misinformation as it would be the key to winning the elections.

KGA