A demand for a hair follicle drug test — directed at Interior Secretary Jonvic Remulla, but reaching past him to President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. and the President’s wife and children — has become Davao City 1st District Rep. Paolo “Pulong” Duterte’s answer to being branded as “sabog.”
The lawmaker laid out the dare directly: “Kung gusto mo talagang malaman kung sino ang ‘high’ at sino ang ‘sabog,’ simple lang naman ang solusyon. Magpa-hair follicle drug test tayo. Sama mo na ang boss mo at asawa’t anak nya. Para isang testing na lang, tapos ang usapan.”
In invoking Remulla’s “boss,” Duterte pointed up the chain to Malacañang, pressing the Interior chief on whether the insult had been aimed at the wrong target altogether and suggesting he reconsider who his “high” label truly fit.
The friction traces back to Duterte’s assertion that the International Criminal Court had already ordered the arrest of Senator Christopher “Bong” Go along with two former police officers — a claim he said came from a source he described as highly reliable, first aired in a Facebook post.
Remulla had waved off that account when reporters at Camp Crame asked him about it. The DILG secretary maintained that no document or notice pointing to such a warrant had reached the government, and offered his explanation for the senator’s name surfacing this way: “Baka sabog siya nung narinig niya.”
That denial did not stand alone. As reported by GMA News, Philippine National Police chief Gen. Jose Melencio Nartatez Jr. likewise said he had no knowledge of any such ICC order against Go, telling reporters the congressman apparently knew something he did not.
The dispute over Go’s legal exposure is not without grounding. The senator’s name appears in ICC records connected to the crimes against humanity case lodged against former president Rodrigo Duterte, the congressman’s father, who remains in detention at The Hague — a detail that places the warrant claim within an active international proceeding rather than open speculation.
Duterte’s drug-test challenge also carries history. He has pushed for years for mandatory hair follicle testing of all government officials, and underwent one himself in October 2024 at a Mandaluyong diagnostics center, with results showing no detected substances above the screening thresholds.
