MISSING CONTEXT: Basketball allowed in barangays

At a glance:

• Claim: Playing basketball is now allowed, provided that players are from the same barangay.
• Rating: MISSING CONTEXT
• The facts: The executive order permitting this was only applicable to Baybay City, Leyte. The guidelines released by the Inter-agency Task Force for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases only allow certain non-contact sports under general community quarantine and modified general community quarantine.
• Why we fact-checked this: Posts containing this claim were flagged by Facebook Claim Check, a tool that detects dubious content on the platform.

Complete details:

A graphic containing supposed guidelines on playing basketball in barangays was reposted and circulated out of context by several Facebook accounts and pages.

The graphic contained the following text: “Basketball is allowed provided only players of the same barangay shall participate in the same.” It cited Executive Order No. 83, Section 11, concerning “regulation on certain activities.”

Posts containing this claim were flagged by Facebook Claim Check, a tool that detects dubious content on the platform.

The claim is missing context. The executive order cited was applicable only to Baybay City, Leyte.

Using reverse image search and keyword searches, Rappler found that the graphic was posted by the city’s Sangguniang Kabataan page on November 13.

The executive order that the claim cited was applicable only to Baybay City, Leyte. It placed the city under modified general community quarantine (MGCQ) and prescribed its policies and protocols against COVID-19. Section 11 detailed the city’s regulation on activities, including contact and non-contact sports.

The Omnibus Guidelines on the Implementation of Community Quarantine in the Philippines – released by the Inter-agency Task Force (IATF) for the Management of Emerging Infectious Diseases – only allow certain non-contact sports under general community quarantine (GCQ) and MGCQ, which do not include basketball.

In September, the Philippine Basketball Association secured a “provisional authority” from the IATF to have a bubble in Clark, Pampanga for its season reboot. – Loreben Tuquero/Rappler.com

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