Ex-AFP general deletes FB post on coup plot after learning source was ‘fake news’

Retired Brigadier General Joselito Kakilala on Thursday said he has already deleted his Facebook post linking "a popular politician" — later revealed to be Senator Antonio Trillanes IV — to supposed destabilization plot after he was informed that his source "could be fake news."

"I just commented in the post, but it is farthest in my mind that I speak against a revered senator…[When I was] told that it could be fake news, I pulled out my comment," Kakilala said in a text message to GMA News Online, referring to Trillanes.

During the Senate finance committee hearing on the proposed 2018 budget of the Department of National Defense (DND), Trillanes said a certain “General Kakilala” has been spreading fake news about a politician recruiting graduates of the Philippine Military Academy (PMA) Class 2006 to launch a coup against President Rodrigo Duterte.

Interviewed by reporters, Trillanes, citing exchanges among PMA graduates in an online forum, said Kakilala was referring to him.

Trillanes’ staff then provided reporters a screen capture of Kakilala’s Facebook post, which read: “Gago itong politician na ito ah. Pinaghirapan ng Armed Forces and AFP Transformation Roadmap para ma-highly professionalize ang corps. Huwag na kayo maniwala yan, bok, maraming sundalo nag sakripisyo including their families dahil na discharged sila for participating in various coups.”

A link from The Asian Policy was also included in the post. The said article states that a politican was recruiting graduates of PMA Class 2006.

Quoting a “respected journalist,” the article said there was information from a “really reliable source” that a “popular politician was trying to convince a certain Captain Popoy of PMA Class 2006 to execute a coup d’etat plan agaisnt President Duterte.”

Kakilala, in his text message to GMA News Online, said he was just speaking his mind as the former head of the Armed Forces of the Philippines Office of Strategic Studies and Strategy Management that oversees the AFP Transformation Roadmap.

“It aims to transform the institution as a highly professionalize corps and ensure its capability development is realized,” he said. —KBK, GMA News