Duterte ‘confesses’ he molested their maid as a teen

Getting jolted by statements  of President Rodrigo Duterte is nothing new to Filipinos, but the Philippine chief arguably broke his own shock meter when he admitted in a public address that he molested his family’s maid when he was a teenager.

Duterte made the revelation before a large crowd at the provincial gymnasium in Kidapawan City, Cotabato, on Saturday, December 29, as he again lambasted the Catholic Church for criticizing him and his policies when it was not exacly faultless.

The President was talking about the New People’s Army before jumping to his other current favorite subject of attack, the Catholic Church.

After berating the fictional Padre Damaso in Jose Rizal’s Noli Me Tangere and the American priest arrested in Biliran for committing abuses against women and children, respectively, Duterte segued to his “confession” to a priest when he was a freshman at the Ateneo de Davao.

Duterte said he stammered at first, then told the impatient priest, “I went to the room of the maid.”

When the priest asked why, the teenage Duterte said: “I lifted the blanket…. I tried to touch what was inside the panty…. I was touching [it]. She woke up so I left the room.”

Then he said he went to the bathroom for the “usual.”

Duterte then told the priest he went back to the maid and “I tried to insert my finger.”

Responding to the priest’s question, Duterte claimed the maid “was closing her eyes, fast asleep” the whole time. And then he said he went back to the bathroom for a second round of the “usual.”

The confession ended with the priest admonishing him, “Oh my God, say 5 Our Fathers, 5 Hail Marys, because you will go to hell.”

To unbelievers of his confession, Duterte told the audience, “Totoo man (It’s really true)!… It’s true.”

Then he again reverted to the supposed abuses of Catholic priests: “Kaya ‘yung abuses ah, dahan-dahan lang kayo. ‘Yung Katoliko has a very loaded thing. So it has to correct itself before it can call [me out] – ‘pag hindi, kalaban talaga nila ako. And I will continue to attack them.”

(So go slow on these abuses. The Catholic [Church] has a very loaded thing. So it has to correct itself before it can call [me out] – if not, I’ll really be their enemy. And I will continue to attack them.)

Duterte also claimed that “Pope Leo XIV” fathered Spanish-Italian noblewoman Lucrezia Borgia. She’s actually the illegitimate daugher of Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia who later became Pope Alexander VI, and his mistress, Vannozza dei Cattanei.

In the same speech, the President’s tirade did not just end with the Catholic Church but extended to the Holy Trinity and Jesus Christ himself. He dismissed the Holy Trinity as “silly” and Jesus as “unimpressive” as he chose to die on the cross rather than just zap  all his foes to oblivion.

The President made the remark a day after the Social Weather Stations (SWS) released its latest survey results showing Duterte enjoying a “very good” +60 net satisfaction rating in December, higher than his rating in September.

Will Malacañang dismiss the President’s confession, which involved the molestation of someone employed by his family, as just another tall tale to entertain his audience? (READ: Not just a joke: The social cost of Duterte’s rape remarks) – with a report from Mara Cepeda/Rappler.com

Editor’s Note: We earlier reported that Lucrezia Borgia’s father, Cardinal Rodrigo Borgia, later became Pope Alexander XIV. He actually took the name Pope Alexander VI. We have already corrected this.