President Rodrigo Duterte capped off a public speech in Tokyo last night by kissing a few women from the audience in the presence of his long-time partner Honeylet Avanceña.
In a speech before members of the Filipino community at the Palace Hotel, Duterte asked several women from the crowd for a kiss after calling Avanceña his “one and only” and his “First Lady”.
Duterte was previously married to Elizabeth Zimmerman before it was annulled in 2000, ending their 27-year marriage.
Before kissing the women, Duterte defended himself from feminist critics who blasted him for kissing a married overseas Filipino worker on the lips during a visit to Seoul in June last year.
“There’s no ill will meant when I kissed [her]. [But my critics said] I’m sleazy,” he said in a mix of English and Filipino.
He then told his audience to look up the meaning of the word “misandry.”
“You text the word ‘misandry.’ It characterizes those women who attacked me because I kissed a woman [in Seoul],” he said.
Speaking to the female members of his audience, he said: “But that’s the only way you could repay me [for the work I’ve done]. I have to be given a kiss that’s really lips-to-lips. Who now wants to volunteer?”
“First of all, you shouldn’t be married. Second, you can’t be a minor,” he said. Speaking to one woman, he said: “You ma’am, you want a smooch? Let’s do it so we could all go home.”
In the video uploaded on the Facebook page of government-owned Radio Television Malacañang, the camera pans to the audience when Duterte kisses the women. But a video obtained by newspaper Philippine Star showed him kissing at least two women on stage on the cheek as the crowd in the hotel screamed their appreciation.
Duterte has often been called out for his misogynistic ways.
During his 2016 campaign, he infamously said he “should have been the first person to participate” in the gang rape of an Australian missionary, an incident that happened in Davao while he was mayor of the city in 1989.
In January of last year, he also joked about offering “42 virgins” as a gift to tourists who come to the Philippines. On Sunday, he cracked a rape joke during the graduation rites of the Philippine Military Academy, prompting a backlash from feminists in the country.
