Lacierda hits blogger’s ‘malicious’ claims on Roxas hiring ‘influencer’

Former Presidential spokesperson Edwin Lacierda slammed as “malicious” and “irresponsible” a blogger’s accusation that former Interior Secretary Mar Roxas hired an “influencer” to trend the #NasaanAngPangulo topic on social media in 2015.

Rey Joseph Nieto of “Thinking Pinoy” blog alleged, during the Senate committee on public information and mass media hearing on fake news on Wednesday, that Roxas did it to “attack former President Benigno Aquino III in January 2015.”

Nieto named a certain Joyce Ramirez as behind the campaign.

Lacierda, a lawyer and spokesperson during the Aquino administration, denied the plot, saying “If he (Nieto) thinks #NasaanAngPangulo was used to distance Mar Roxas from the President, it wasn’t true.”

Senator Grace Poe who chairs the Senate panel, meanwhile, underscored the need for Nieto to produce evidence on his claims. /je