FACT CHECK: Romualdez’s call for Dutertes to ‘respect’ Marcos taken out of context
Claim: House Speaker Martin Romualdez recently urged the Duterte family to respect President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. amid the ongoing rift between the two political allies-turned-enemies.
Rating: MISSING CONTEXT
Why we fact-checked this: Posts bearing the claim recently circulated in April 2025, a month after the arrest of former president Rodrigo Duterte and his transfer to the International Criminal Court (ICC) over crimes against humanity charges.
An April 19 post from a Facebook page named “Paolo Duterte Supporters” has already gathered an estimated 17,000 reactions, 11,000 comments, and 1,000 shares.
The post’s caption reads, “Speaker Romualdez sinabihan ang pamilyang Duterte na igalang ang pamilyang Marcos (Speaker Romualdez told Duterte clan to respect Marcos family).”
The facts: While Romualdez did tell the Duterte family to respect Marcos, he made the statement on January 29, 2024, not April 2025. The posts circulating online falsely implied that Romualdez made the statement recently amid the ongoing political tensions between the former political allies.
After former president Duterte and his son, Davao City Mayor Sebastian Duterte, criticized Marcos during a prayer rally in Davao on January 28, 2024, Romualdez defended his cousin, saying: “Sa pamilyang Duterte, siguro konting galang naman sa ating mahal na presidente tsaka sa pamilya niya. Noong panahon ng rehimen niyo, iginalang naman kayo (To the Duterte family, maybe they should show a little respect for our beloved president and his family. During your regime, you were shown respect too).”
During the January 2024 rally, the elder Duterte accused Marcos of being a “drug addict” while Sebastian Duterte called on the President to resign due to his alleged incompetence as an executive leader.
At the time, the rally aimed to oppose the Romualdez-backed push for charter change or the amendment of the 1987 Constitution. Marcos previously expressed his support for an economic charter change, but critics expressed concern that political provisions may be introduced in the amendments.
Broken alliance: The posts circulated amid the political rift between the former allies, which has intensified with Duterte’s arrest and transfer to the ICC. (READ: [DECODED] How online supporters made a victim of Duterte after ICC arrest)
While the former president’s supporters criticized the Marcos administration and called the arrest politically motivated, Marcos said that the government was just “doing its job” as part of its commitment to Interpol. – Angelee Kaye Abelinde/Rappler.com
Angelee Kaye Abelinde, a campus journalist from Naga City, is a second-year Journalism student of Bicol University and the current copy editor of The Bicol Universitarian. She is a graduate of the Aries Rufo Journalism Fellow of Rappler for 2024.
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