Manipulated image falsely shared as evidence of Philippine media's cover-up about president's health
- Published on April 20, 2026 at 10:36
- 3 min read
- By Lucille SODIPE, AFP Philippines
Amid swirling rumours that Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos is gravely ill or dead, social media posts have shared an altered screenshot with a false claim it was evidence that a major broadcaster attempted to conceal his health issues by misrepresenting an old photo as recent. The picture in the false posts is in fact a handout from the presidential office on April 8, 2026. The outlet has also said its post was misused.
"It's not just GMA [News] who likes to recycle video; ABS-CBN also recycles, but photos this time. Just to be able to say [Marcos] is well," says a Tagalog-language Facebook post shared on April 9.
It appears to compare screenshots of two ABS-CBN News Facebook posts, one purportedly shared on March 25, 2024 and another with a time stamp indicating it was taken two hours before the screenshot was captured. Both feature the same photo of Marcos with guests and a framed portrait of the Virgin of Guadalupe, patron saint of Mexico.
Rumours that the Philippine leader is confined to a hospital, hiding a terminal illness or is actually dead have circulated online since he failed to attend an event for Filipino migrant workers on April 6 (archived link).
On April 10, a petition was filed with the Philippine Supreme Court to oblige members of the president's staff to "disclose the true state of the physical and mental health of the President pursuant to Section 12 of Article VII of the Constitution" (archived here, here and here).
In January, after similar speculation surged on social media, Marcos told the public he was diagnosed with diverticulitis, a painful inflammation of pouches that form in the large intestine (archived link). According to a spokesperson for the president, he spent a night in a private Manila hospital (archived link).
There has been no public advisory from the president's doctors about the state of his health since January.
Posts that feature the two screenshots were widely shared across Facebook, Threads and X.
Comments show people believed Philippine media outlets were complicit in supposedly hiding the president's absence from the public.
"Even mainstream media is not credible anymore," one said.
"This is how the mainstream media fools us," another said. "[They're] the number one fake news peddlers."
'Misused'
But in a fact-check article, ABS-CBN News said one of the screenshots in the circulating false posts had been "manipulated" (archived link).
"The real report by ABS-CBN News was posted on Facebook and its website on April 8, 2026, contrary to the March 25, 2024 date in the screenshot... [the false post] also used a wrong logo for ABS-CBN," the Tagalog-language article reads (archived here and here).
"This is not the first time ABS-CBN News was misused to spread false information."
The broadcaster published one of the pictures on the day in a report headlined: "Marcos receives devotional image of Guadalupe ahead of national pilgrimage".
It credited the picture to the Presidential Communications Office (PCO), which also published other pictures of the same event to Google Drive on the same day (archived here, here and here).
Further keyword searches found Marcos's meeting was recorded on video by state-run broadcaster RTVMalacanang and uploaded to its official YouTube channel (archived link).
"The Pilgrim Image of Our Lady of Guadalupe is scheduled to arrive in Manila on June 13, 2026 and will visit more than 52 cathedrals and major shrines nationwide," part of its caption reads. "The Philippine pilgrimage is part of the Novena Intercontinental Guadalupana (2025–2031), a devotional event leading up to the 500th anniversary of the Marian apparitions in 2031."
Similar photos were also posted on April 8 on the official Facebook page for the upcoming pilgrimage of Mexico's popular religious icon to the Catholic-majority nation (archived link).
The page, managed by local Catholic media outlet Jesuit Communications, was only created on March 13, 2026 (archived here and here).
Errors in caption
The caption in the false post also misidentifies the two people with Marcos in the photos.
Jaime Laya, chair of the Cultural Center of the Philippines and Cheloy Garafil, former head of the PCO, are not in the photos contrary to the claim (archived here and here).
The man standing on the left is Filipino businessman Ernest Escaler, who heads the committee in charge of the pilgrimage in the Philippines (archived here and here).
The one on the right is named Martin Achirica Ramos, who led a group from Mexico (archived here and here).
Similar disinformation involving the Philippine media has been debunked by AFP in the past.
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