Panelo: Kuwait Times' Duterte cartoons 'excessively stupid, outrightly malicious'

Presidential Chief Legal Counsel Salvador Panelo on Sunday dismissed the cartoons published in the Kuwait Times as "excessively stupid" and "outrightly malicious."

"Those Kuwaiti Times cartoons in so far as it projects PRRD as a murderer is excessively stupid, destructively moronic, outrightly malicious and the exact opposite of reality as evidenced by the latest high survey rating and the overwhelming support of the majority of the Filipinos given the President as well as the approval to PRRD's declaration of Martial Law by Congress and the Supreme Court," Panelo said in a statement on Sunday.

He was referring to several cartoons published by the Kuwait Times, said to be the first English-language daily newspaper in the Arabian Gulf region, based in Kuwait.

Among those published in the paper are cartoons which showed a policeman with a gun pointed at a dead dog, claiming that the animal was cured of canine scabies.

Other cartoons showed President Rodrigo Duterte with one hand holding a gun, and another holding a noose with a dead man laying on the floor with several bullet holes on his body.

Aside from the Kuwait Times, several other international publications also ran stories on the government's controversial campaign against illegal drugs.

The New York Times in August ran a front page photo and a story about the rise in killings of street-level drug personalities since Duterte took power on June 30.

The campaign against illegal drugs was also criticized by Time Magazine in April, where Duterte won the online poll for the "100 Most Influential People."

Despite this, public satisfaction over Duterte's performance grew in the second quarter of the year to 78 percent, marking a new personal record high.

According to the results of the latest Social Weather Stations (SWS) Survey, Duterte's net satisfaction in Mindanao dropped 12 points to +75, though still considered "excellent." In Visayas and Luzon, his net satisfaction went up to +73 and +58, respectively. —Jon Viktor D. Cabuenas/ALG, GMA News