Presidential Communications Office (PCO) Undersecretary and Palace Press Officer Atty. Claire Castro during a press briefing with the Malacañang Press Corps (MPC) on March 3, 2025. | FILE PHOTO: Screengrab from RTVM
MANILA, Philippines — It is far-fetched to compare former President Rodrigo Duterte to assassinated democracy icon Benigno “Ninoy” Aquino Jr., especially when Duterte once likened himself to Adolf Hitler, a Palace official said.
“We never heard former President Duterte compare himself to Ninoy, but rather to Hitler,” Palace Press Officer Claire Castro said during Monday’s press briefing. She added that Duterte once stated he would be happy to slaughter drug addicts, likening it to Hitler’s massacre of millions of Jews.
Castro also noted that Aquino had no record of mass murder or crimes against humanity.
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“So, it is very far-fetched to compare former President Duterte to Ninoy Aquino, who had no record of mass murder or crimes against humanity. Former President Duterte himself preferred to compare himself to Hitler,” she added.
The comparison was made by Vice President Sara Duterte in a speech in The Hague, Netherlands, where her father is currently detained pending trial at the International Criminal Court for crimes against humanity allegedly committed during his administration’s drug war.
“The desire to go home will also be the end of your life. You’ll become like Ninoy Aquino Jr.,” she said in a video published by SMNI on Monday.
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“He told me, “If that is my fate, so be it, as long as I can return to the Philippines,’” she added.
The vice president said in a previous interview that she will not return to the Philippines until she sets up a legal team for her father and until a next of kin arrives.