Because of Nic Gabunada’s perceived ability to marshal many FB accounts and pages, a target board was placed over his back and he became the object of malicious scrutiny. Several times, he was banned from Facebook and his account suspended on allegation he has links to over 150 pro-Duterte pages and accounts spreading unverified reports and news stories and branded as purveyors of fake accounts.
This shakedown happened on March 19, 2019 at the start of the mid term elections campaign. Whoever thought Gabunada’s suspension from Facebook will increase the winning changes of the opposition was dead wrong — all the eight senatorial candidates of the opposition lost. Local candidates supported by the Duterte administration sweep the local contests.
This is the fourth of a seven part series, first posted on Facebook by veteran journalist Edwin Espejo.
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Decapitating the ‘trolls’ of Duterte
Fourth of a series
By Edwin Espejo
June 29, 2021
Gabunada was one of the few members of the Duterte presidential campaign team who did not seek position in government after the Davao City mayor won the elections.
He was nonetheless appointed board of director of the United Coconut Planters Bank a year later.
Gabunada went on to also establish his own public relations company, buoyed by his success and the goodwill he generated in the 2016 elections.
Meanwhile, the throng of Duterte online supporters also morphed into a formidable social media force.
After the 2016 elections, their social media presence took lives of their own. Many politicians and marketing firms have since sought to enlist the growing community of social media influencers as among their enablers and amplifiers.
Gabunada maintained relations to many of these Duterte social media denizens, either by him seeking out to them or others inviting and including him either as admin or editor.
Because of his perceived ability to marshal many of these accounts and pages, a target board was placed over his back and he became the object of malicious scrutiny. Several times, he was banned from Facebook and his account remained suspended on allegation he has linked in over 150 pro-Duterte pages and accounts spreading unverified reports and news stories and branded as purveyors of fake accounts.
This came after Facebook was flooded with complaints from Duterte critics who claimed it is being used as platform to spread disinformation and foster hate campaign.
Inevitably, putting one and two together led to Gabunada being declared as a pariah on Facebook.
But in a report by The Strait Times in October 2018, many of the pages taken down cannot be ascertained whether the administrators of these pages were actual supporters of the president or were just profiting off his popularity although some have been traced to the Philippine military or police.