Duterte fans falsely claim ex-Philippine leader built China megabridge
As a bitter dispute raged between former Philippine president Rodrigo Duterte and current leader Ferdinand Marcos, pro-Duterte TikTok accounts shared footage of a massive bridge that they falsely claimed was built during his term. The video, which racked up tens of thousands of views, in fact shows China's huge Hangzhou Bay Bridge, which opened to the public eight years before Duterte took office.
"Wow, so this is the bridge project built by Father Digong when he was still president," read Tagalog-language text overlaid on a November 5 TikTok video, using former president Duterte's popular nickname.
"Manila to Mindanao," the overlay added, referring to the Philippine capital and its second largest island located south of the archipelago.
The video in the post -- viewed more than 20,000 times -- is composed of four clips showing a six-lane, cable-stayed bridge spanning across the sea.
"Duterte legacy," read the caption of the post, which was shared by a pro-Duterte account.
The video spread across various TikTok accounts that expressed support for the former president.
The powerful Duterte and Marcos families have had a public falling-out as they attempted to shore up their rival support bases and secure key positions ahead of the mid-term elections next year and presidential polls in 2028 (archived link).
They previously allied during the 2022 vote that Marcos won in a landslide with Duterte's daughter Sara Duterte as his vice presidential running mate.
Many TikTok users pointed out there was in fact no bridge linking Manila to any part of Mindanao island -- which is over 1,400 kilometres (910 miles) away (archived link).
However, others appeared to believe the posts.
"People will thank President Ferdinand Marcos but this could not have been constructed if Father Digong did not start it," one commented.
"I thought this was from abroad, but it's actually in the Philippines," another wrote.
Shanghai bridge
The video shared online shows a huge bridge built in China's eastern Zhejiang province years before Duterte took office in 2016.
Reverse image searches of the video shared online found similar footage posted on TikTok on June 19, 2024 captioned "Hangzhou Bay Cross-sea bridge" (archived link).
Below is a screenshot comparison of the video shared in false posts (left) and the TikTok post identifying it as the Hangzhou Bay Bridge (right):
The 36-kilometre (22-mile) Hangzhou Bay Bridge opened in 2008, linking up the financial hub of Shanghai with the booming industrial city of Ningbo (archived link).
AFP confirmed the location of the bridge by comparing it with geotagged and satellite images of the Hangzhou Bay Bridge on Google Maps.
Identical pink fences, white lane markings and street lamps from the first clip match the features seen in a geotagged image taken in May 2023 (archived link).
The second clip -- which shows the bridge descending after crossing the arches -- is a feature shown on the Google Maps imagery of the Hangzhou Bay Bridge (archived link).
Meanwhile, the clip showing a zoomed-out footage of a tower, a circular structure and an A-shaped arch attached to the bridge corresponds to the satellite image of the Chinese bridge on Google Earth (archived link).
The last clip depicting a close-up view of a tower in front of a bridge shows the Hangzhou Bay Lookout Tower, which AFP confirmed using a geotagged image on Google Maps (archived link).
AFP has previously debunked posts misrepresenting photos of bridges from other countries as Philippine infrastructure here, here and here.
