Claim: There is a leaked COMELEC resolution issued by the COMELEC’s first division disqualifying senatorial candidate Neri Colmenares and the party-list groups of the Makabayan bloc.

Rating: FALSE

Context:

On May 7 (7:32 p.m.), Lamrag Sinirangan (2022) posted a supposedly leaked resolution from the Commission on Elections (COMELEC) First Division stating that senatorial candidate Neri Colmenares and Makabayan bloc party-list groups Bayan Muna, AnakPawis, Kabataan, Gabriela, and ACT Teachers have been disqualified due to having links with communists and terrorists.

The About section of Lamrag Sinirangan’s Facebook page states that it is a non-government organization but does not have any contact information.

Around three hours later (10:02 p.m.), the COMELEC denied the existence of this resolution, explicitly branding it as “fake” (Rappler, 2022).

Lamrag Sinirangan’s post containing the fake COMELEC resolution has been deleted as of 11:33 p.m. on May 7.

The day before (May 6), Kontra Daya (2022) fact-checked the false claim in the flyers scattered along a highway of Cagayan claiming that the party-list groups have been disqualified by the COMELEC. These flyers used the official campaign banner of Vote SAFE Pilipinas.

This kind of disinformation targets the Makabayan bloc that has been critical not just of the Duterte administration but also of the Marcos-Duterte tandem in the 2022 polls. Red-tagging is the highest form of “fake news” (Assidao, 2021) which should be strongly denounced as it leads to arrest, detention and even the murder of those falsely accused of having communist or terrorist links.

References:

• Asiddao, A. (2021, April 24). UP academics remind journalists to recognize context of red-tagging in PH. Bulatlat. https://www.bulatlat.com/2021/04/24/up-academics-remind-journalists-to-recognize-context-of-red-tagging-in-ph/
• Kontra Daya. (2022, May 6). Fact-check: Makabayan bloc party-list groups not disqualified. https://kontradaya.org/fact-check-makabayan-bloc-party-list-groups-not-disqualified/
• Lamrag Sinirangan. (2022, May 7). Breaking news: COMELEC disqualifies Makabayan bloc party list groups and Neri Colmenares. We are waiting for official statement of the [Image attached] [Status update]. Facebook. https://www.facebook.com/110845307227779/posts/565449848433987/
• Rappler [@rapplerdotcom]. (2022, May 7). Update: Comelec disowns documents circulating online which supposedly showed that the poll body has disqualified Bayan Muna and other progressive [Tweet]. Twitter. https://twitter.com/rapplerdotcom/status/1522940028565229568