Vice President Sara Duterte personally owns the laptop she is accused of having hurled at a defense team lawyer — and that, she says, is reason enough the story cannot be true.
“I wouldn’t throw my laptop because it’s mine personally. If it gets damaged, I’d also be the one to spend money to buy a new one,” Duterte said during a May 6 meeting with Filipino community members in The Hague, Netherlands.
The allegation — that she threw a laptop at Michael Poa, a lawyer serving as spokesperson for her impeachment defense team — has been circulating online and drew renewed attention after lawyer Lorna Kapunan, a known Duterte critic, said on radio Monday that the claims were “probably” true.
“Their defense team’s messaging is becoming chaotic… Maybe he really was hit in the head by a laptop, that’s what the trolls are saying,” Kapunan said in Filipino on DzMM, referring to Poa.
Duterte flatly rejected the account. “Actually, to be honest, it’s already such a trash topic that it should no longer be given attention,” she said in Filipino. “Never in history have I thrown a laptop at a colleague, an employee, or a lawyer.”
She framed the rumor as part of a broader pattern of deliberate disinformation. “It’s a trash rumor, related to what we discussed yesterday about how opponents use misinformation or disinformation to distort the story in favor of the narrative they want to push,” the Vice President said.
Duterte also said she has limited use for laptops in general, relying on office staff for documents and turning to one only for video calls. “The only time I use a laptop is during Zoom meetings so the image looks better on Zoom,” she said.
Duterte is currently in the Netherlands visiting her father, former President Rodrigo Duterte, who is in ICC custody pending trial on crimes against humanity charges tied to his administration’s anti-drug campaign. At home, the House committee on justice has approved a report containing the articles of impeachment against her, which now heads to plenary deliberations.
