‘Polvoron’ campaign emerges amid Marcos-Duterte political tussle

MANILA, Philippines — Pro-Duterte accounts unleashed a firestorm of hyperpartisan content against President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. at the tail end of 2023, accusing him of abusing illegal substances under the thinly veiled euphemism of "polvoron use.”

From late December 2023 to January 2024, anonymous accounts flooded several social media platforms with hundreds of posts and videos claiming, without proof, that the president had been caught on video using illegal substances and that this would be used to unseat him from office.

Philstar.com’s analysis of the posts during this time indicates this was no random smear campaign against Marcos, and in some cases, his wife First Lady Liza Araneta-Marcos. 

While the “polvoron” allegation has been mentioned before, Philstar.com’s monitoring finds that the same 12 Facebook pages repeatedly posted identical videos five times from November to January, all of which aimed to promote the conspiracy that the president has been caught taking illegal substances.

These videos against Marcos were consistently uploaded within seconds of each other and used the same captions to fuel speculation against the president and his family.

Recently viral videos and/or photos of Vice President Sara Duterte and former Commission on Elections Commissioner Rowena Guanzon where they brandished a “polvoron," a Filipino milk candy that turns to powder when crushed, were also repurposed by content creators to fuel unsubstantiated claims against Marcos.

These photos and videos uploaded by hyperpartisan pages have some of the markings of an influence operation that Philstar.com is tracking across all social media platforms, groups and spaces on the internet. 

Several of these posts appeared right after two notable political developments in the second half of 2023: the House’s removal of the vice president's confidential funds in October and former President Rodrigo Duterte's public accusation of corruption against House Speaker Martin Romualdez, Marcos’ cousin in November.

Among the earliest videos that triggered the wave of "polvoron" allegations was a Nov. 18, 2023 YouTube video uploaded by "Bagong Lipunan" that alleged Marcos used illegal substances