Former President Rodrigo Roa Duterte has stopped taking Fentanyl drug even before he was elected as the country's chief executive in 2016.
According to his former chief legal counsel Salvador Panelo, Duterte had publicly announced in the past that he used to take Fentanyl to relieve "the pain he got in a motorcycle accident that broke one of his shoulder" when he was still a mayor in Davao.
"That was before he became President. He had stopped taking it before his presidency because somehow the pain disappeared," Panelo said.
On Monday, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. alleged that his predecessor is taking fentanyl drug for "a very long time."
Speaking to reporters in an ambush interview after delivering his departure speech in Pasay City, Marcos said he learned about Duterte's alleged fentanyl usage between 2018 or 2019.
"Ako, I think it's the fentanyl. Fentanyl is the strongest painkiller that you can buy. It is highly addictive and it has very serious side effects. PRRD has been taking the drug for a very long time now," he said.
His statement comes after Duterte accused him of being a drug addict, adding that he saw the president's name in the Philippine Drug Enforcement Agency's (PDEA) drug watch list.
Duterte also said the military and law enforcement agencies know about this issue.
In response, the PDEA said in a statement that Marcos was never on the government watch list for illegal drugs.
