Nagged by questions about his health, Philippines President Ferdinand “BongBong” Marcos on Monday stepped outside of his office and, rather than starting by addressing reporters’ said questions verbally, simply did jumping jacks and jogged in place while wearing a suit, the AP reports.
“I challenge anyone who are saying that I am sick, that they come and exercise with me,” Marcos then said. “You come to the gym with me. Let’s see who can lift the weights better. Those people who tell you that I’m sick, that I’m paralyzed, they’re all liars.” The AP does not describe Marcos’s delivery, as in whether he was particularly winded, but the absence of any such qualifier kind of answers that question, as does the apparent ebullience of the statement. The questions from reporters and social media rumors that the 68 year-old leader was on his deathbed did not come from nowhere as in January Marcos was hospitalized with a serious but treatable abdominal issue.
There’s no details in the AP story on what time of day this appearance occurred or, if it was in the morning/early afternoon, whether Marcos retired for the rest of the day. But that’s just needling, the bottom line is that he did the jumping jacks rather than have some unethical, supplicatory quack put his name on a letter that he did not write, a letter describing the president as being in completely perfect health, even healthier than a notorious fitness freak 15 years his junior. Nor did Marcos challenge a 36 year-old leftist congresswoman to a cognitive test and then just not do anything to set up that face-off. Marcos simply did the jumping jacks and said the rumors are bullshit.