Ex-DOF official Cielo Magno files cyber libel complaint vs Sass Sasot

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Pro-Duterte blogger Sass Sasot baselessly claimed that economics professor Cielo Magno paid billions of pesos to congressmen to search for Mary Grace Piattos

MANILA, Philippines — Economics professor and former finance undersecretary Cielo Magno has filed a cyber libel complaint against blogger Sass Sasot over “malicious, demeaning, and defamatory imputations” in a post on Facebook.

Magno filed the complaint on Tuesday, March 25, at the Quezon City Prosecutor’s Office. 

“Like many others, I have been the subject of malicious imputations and wrongs by Ms. Sasot. It’s time to push back and to use all the legal remedies that are available to us to put an end to this display of impunity,” she wrote in a Facebook post.

Sasot’s post that triggered the complaint baselessly claimed that Magno was giving billions of pesos to unspecified congressmen to search for Mary Grace Piattos, a nonexistent recipient of Vice President Sara Duterte’s confidential funds. (READ: Be The Good: Cielo Magno on the call to abolish confidential funds)

“Sa sobrang galit ni Cielo Magno kay Mary Grace Piattos, binigyan nya ng ilang bilyon mga Congressman para hanapin ito. Economics prof nga. May demand. May supply,” Sasot’s post read.

(Cielo Magno is so angry with Mary Grace Piattos that she gave a few billions to congressmen to find this person. She is indeed an economics professor. There is demand. There is supply.)

This was in reference to Magno’s own Facebook post from 2023, where she seemed to question President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.’s rice price cap using a basic supply and demand chart. She was later asked to step down from her post as finance undersecretary.

In the past few months, Sasot had been harassing Magno for criticizing Vice President Sara Duterte’s confidential fund spending while supposedly ignoring the unliquidated funds of the University of the Philippines, where she teaches. Sasot also repeatedly tags Magno in her posts debating the existence of the West Philippine Sea.

Rappler obtained a copy of Magno’s complaint, which stated that Sasot’s posts were “purposely made to malign, dishonor, discredit, and insult [Magno’s] character and reputation as a person and as a practitioner of [her] profession as an economist.”

“The said posts written by [Sasot] contain false statements consciously and deliberately made to mock and destroy my reputation, integrity, and character as a person also before my family,” she wrote in her complaint.

Magno also said she and her family continue to suffer from anxiety, mental anguish, and sleepless nights over Sasot’s posts. 

Sasot is a prominent pro-Duterte blogger who has repeatedly spread disinformation, pro-China propaganda, and attacks against critics of the Duterte family. Social media users have previously called to deplatform Sasot, and her Facebook profile had become inaccessible on different occasions.

In the Philippines, libelous social media posts are punishable under the Cybercrime Prevention Act. — Rappler.com