HOAX: NU students ‘walk out’ of Senator Hontiveros’ speech

Claim: Students of National University (NU) walked out of Senator Risa Hontiveros’ speech about Raissa Robles’ book “Marcos Martial Law: Never Again.”

The incident allegedly happened on a Thursday, but no specific date was mentioned.

The blog citizenbalitaphil.blogspot.com posted the claim on September 20. It was also shared 15 times on different Facebook pages and groups. All of these accounted for a combined total of at least 9,003 interactions and 2,060,605 followers as of September 25.

The claim was published as early as March by radiohubph.info, blogs.trendolizer.com, and phnewspride.blogspot.com, which was the source cited by Citizen Balita Phil. 

The blog post was taken down before this Fact Check article was published.

Rating: FALSE

The facts: NU denied that Hontiveros gave any speech in their campus or that any walk out had happened.

This claim appears to have been reshared in time for the protests on the 46th anniversary of the declaration of Martial Law last Friday, September 21.

The university published on Facebook on March 16 a statement denying the “walk-out.” The nearest Thursday before that was March 14. 

A Google reverse image search on the featured image used by Citizen Balita Phil in its hoax post shows that it was taken from a 2013 demonstration named “Katipunan Kontra Korupsyon” organized by Ateneo de Manila, University of the Philippines Diliman, and Miriam College.

Meanwhile, a second photo on the blog post, with the text “Bye Bye Risa”, is from a scene in a 2012 YouTube video titled “MAGNITUDE 14.0 – NATIONAL UNIVERSITY – MANILA” showing some students dancing.

The blog phnewspride.blogspot.com has been responsible for spreading disinformation such as an ex-Liberal Party congressman buying an Alabang mansion using Typhoon Yolanda rehabilitation funds or, more recent recently, two ex-Comelec programmers arrested for destroying evidence of 2016 elections fraud.

The former claim was posted by realspotnews.info, dutertenewsglobal.info, pinoybuzzfeed.comdailybuzzph.com, and aramco.netviral.com. The latter, meanwhile, was posted on pinoypolitics.altervista.org, trendingnewsphfiles.info, tropasociety.altervista.org, todaysbalita.info, pagbabagongtunay.info, and incaseumissed.blogspot.com. — Miguel Imperial/Rappler.com

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