A shocking piece of fake news has surfaced, not only spreading lies but also disrespectfully using images of children from Santor Elementary School and insulting the trusted leaders of Santor, Delfin Albano. This fake news story claimed that three Europeans were doing bad things, accusing them of sex trafficking. It was uploaded on Facebook and publicly published by a fake Facebook profile on June 26th.
One of the people targeted by this fake news story is the father of the children abducted by Regina Magundayao Valdez. This father, on Monday, June 23rd, had managed to be with his children for the second time since they were taken. He celebrated their birthday (a late celebration) with them, because Regina, the mother who illegally took them, had stopped him from greeting them on their actual birthday. The Punong Barangay of Santor and the Principal of Santor Elementary School attempted to discuss the matter, but Regina M. Valdez refused to sit down at the table with them. Instead, Regina called the police and lied, falsely reporting an attempted kidnapping.
When the police arrived, with a staff member from the Department of Social Welfare and Development (DSWD), the father could finally explain how Regina stopped and impeded Gerard’s normal development by interrupting his speech therapy. The DSWD then announced that they would handle the case to temporarily find an educational solution for the child and reach an agreement between the parents.
Fake News Starts the Day After
The very next day after these events, the children did not go to school. According to sources in the Philippines consulted by the Diario16+ newspaper, they have been absent for the rest of the week. Coinciding with the children’s absence, a dummy Facebook profile appeared. It used the wrong spelling of the father's name and impersonated him. Facebook took it down in two days after many people who support the father reported the said fake profile.
But these illegal things on Facebook did not stop. Perhaps because the first fake profile was taken down quickly, new ones emerged. A new fake Facebook profile with the account name – Sayas Myla has appeared, sharing a shocking fake news story. This false story puts Santor authorities in a bad light and, on top of that, exploits the school's children. The reality is that the Barangay Captain, the principal, and the person dispatched by the DSWD were working to resolve the case, but the fake news claimed the school visitors were sex slave recruiters, and in the news, two photographs appeared with the classmates of Gerard, the abducted minor.
Only Regina Knew This Detail in the Fake News
What's particularly strange about this fake news is that it claimed the three Europeans were looking for trouble, explicitly mentioning the Municipalities up north, up to Tuguegarao. In reality, the children's father and his companions were never in Tuguegarao, as they immediately returned to Manila on Tuesday, June 24th.
On their way to Manila, the father received a message from Regina. In that message, the man felt Regina was trying to blackmail him. Because the father understood that his presence in the area was bothering Regina, he sent her a tricky WhatsApp message saying: "I'll remain one week more in Tuguegarao."
The fact that the father and the people with him were all back in Manila, but the fake news claimed that the three foreigners were roaming in Tuguegarao. Only one person in Santor believed they were in Tuguegarao, and that was Regina Magundayao Valdez.
This makes it clear that whoever wrote the fake news used incorrect information provided to Regina Magundayao Valdez.
Will Regina help find out who insulted the people of Santor and their leaders?
Someone who surely will not help is Regina's best friend, Juvy Grace Maniquez. She left Santor two days ago, just when the neighborhood got angry about the fake news and was trying to help report it on Facebook. On the day the photos were taken, Juvy Grace Maniquez was filming at the school, and it appears that the images in the post were taken from the position where she was, since the person who took these pictures zoomed in to get a better shot of the children.