Philippine President Ferdinand Marcos Jr stated that he found the threats levied against him by his former running mate, Vice President Sara Duterte, to be "troubling" after Duterte received backlash for placing a conditional hit on Marcos, an action she has attempted to defend herself for.
During a Saturday morning briefing, Duterte stated that she had made contact with an assassin, instructing them to kill Marcos, his wife and the speaker of Philippines' House of Representatives, but only if Duterte herself were to turn up dead, reported Al Jazeera.
"The statements we heard in the previous days were troubling," Marcos said in a video response he released on Monday. "There is the reckless use of profanities and threats to kill some of us."
"I will fight them," he said.
"If planning the assassination of the president is that easy, how much more for ordinary citizens?"
For her part, Duterte expressed that her statements threatening Marcos were "maliciously taken out of logical context". She previously tried to subtly retract her own comments, stating that her threats were not legitimate but simply born out of a fear for her own life.
"If I expressed the concern, they will say that's a threat to the life of the president?" she said, according to AP News.
"Why would I kill him if not for revenge from the grave? There is no reason for me to kill him. What's the benefit for me?" Duterte told journalists.
The daughter of former President Rodrigo Duterte and a member of the powerful Duterte family further questioned how seriously the National Security Council (NSC) took threats against Marcos in an open letter she published.
The presidential security force has been "coordinating with law enforcement agencies to detect, deter, and defend against any and all threats to the president and the first family" since the threat by Duterte was levied.
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