Coordinated noise: ‘Kangaroo court’ comments flood ICC Facebook page after rejection of Duterte bid for interim release

By Nikko A. Balbedina III & Felipe F. Salvosa II
PressOne.PH

In an apparent bid to discredit the International Criminal Court (ICC) and politicize its rejection of former president Rodrigo Duterte’s request for interim release ahead of his trial, a surge of synchronized comments swarmed the court’s Facebook page, ranging from calling it a “kangaroo court” to alleging it was paid off by the Marcoses.

GRAPHICS BY NIKKO BALBEDINA

The swarm of comments and reactions, which lacked substantive content and mostly rehashed Duterte’s legal talking points, signalled a strategy of coordinated noise among the ex-president’s supporters on social media in response to an adverse court decision.

Why it matters: Coordinated bursts of misleading and harmful narratives deepen political divides and distort public understanding of real-world events. As political tensions rise in the Philippines, these online surges can shape perceptions of institutions and fuel further polarization.

What we’ve found: On Nov. 28, the ICC livestreamed its rejection of the interim release bid of Duterte, who is facing charges of crimes against humanity for his administration’s war on drugs that allegedly killed 30,000 people extrajudicially.

• Drawing more than 100,000 comments, the livestream became the second most engaged post to date of the ICC’s Facebook page, trailing closely a March 15 post about Duterte’s initial appearance before the court that drew 117, 515 comments.
• Hostile comments about the court’s decision were posted in the evening of Nov. 28 until early morning the following day, and spilled over to the ICC’s other posts that were unrelated to Duterte’s case.
• The contents of the comments repeat across the court’s Facebook page’s most recent posts.

The narratives: PressOne.PH extracted and analyzed the Facebook comments posted in the first 12 hours of the surge and found several themes receiving the strongest push:

• The synchronized commenters labeled the ICC a “kangaroo court,” referring to a tribunal that carries out sham proceedings. Some comments swapped “kangaroo” for “crocodile” court, echoing the Filipino colloquial term for corrupt officials, or “cash” court.
• Comments carried an anti-West sentiment, with the ICC labeled a “political court” and accused of stalling cases involving powerful figures like Vladimir Putin or Benjamin Netanyahu while targeting only those the West allegedly wanted imprisoned.
• Others continued to question the ICC’s jurisdiction and raised Philippine sovereignty, a key argument of Duterte’s defense team.
• Our dataset, comprising over 1,000 comments, originated from just 277 unique accounts, with approximately one-tenth appearing to be duplicates or near-duplicates. Repeated keywords signalled amplification and templated comments.

No proof of Marcos ‘bribery’: Commenters repeatedly alleged, without proof, that the international court had received bribes from President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to try Duterte for crimes against humanity. 

• The alleged payments were supposedly in the form of gold bars, referencing the Tallano gold myth that peaked during the 2022 national elections and helped Marcos’ bid for Malacañang; luggage filled with cash similar to how flood-control funds were allegedly transferred between legislators, contractors, and public works officials; and P100 billion taken from the flood-control budget.

Red flag rewind: Before Duterte’s interim release bid and trial, the ICC Facebook page had been receiving a steady stream of hateful comments, even on posts that are unrelated to the Philippines. 

• In April 2025, Duterte supporters mistook American author Nicholas Kaufmann for the ex-president’s ICC lawyer, Nicholas Kaufman, and flooded the former’s inbox with messages.
• Trolling activity had been directed toward drug war victims and their families, as well as human rights lawyers working on the ICC case.
• An ICC assistant to the counsel, Kristina Conti, had warned that additional cases could be filed before the ICC if online harassment escalated, adding that these could strengthen the argument that the ICC should handle the trial, not a Philippine court.

Strategic engagement: In contrast, ICC content written in Filipino or Bisaya had very little engagement. One post on Nov. 27 explaining the humane conditions at the ICC’s detention center in The Hague had an engagement count of just 15, as of writing. 

• This seems counterintuitive as Duterte’s supposed unjust detention has been a rallying point for his supporters, who have been appealing for his freedom, citing his poor health and old age. 
• In September, the Duterte camp claimed that the former president had been found unconscious in his cell and taken to the hospital for tests, without the family being informed. The ICC did not confirm this, and Vice President Sara Duterte later clarified that such an incident didn’t happen.
• Yet the comment surge targeted English-language posts, signaling a deliberate push to boost engagement and reach an international audience.

PressOne.PH will continue to monitor the Duterte ICC case and verify the claims driving public reaction, to help ensure that facts, not disinformation, frame the conversation. with reports from Regine Cabato & Gian Libot

This report was made possible by an Internews project to build the capacity of news organizations in understanding disinformation and influence operations in the Philippines.