President Duterte agreed that the people who created the learning module that went viral for the use of dirty names should be charged due to the number of young students that may be exposed to the said material on Facebook.
In his public address Monday night, President Duterte said the government is already talking about "punishing" the people behind the controversial material, especially since it went viral on Facebook, a platform that many children use.
"About a good percentage of our studentry is really dependent already Facebook and whatever learning that they could get from there," he said.
"Kami nag-uusap kung (We're talking about) what sort of punishment ," he added.
"If minor, we'll have to deal with a minor. Pero kung matanda na 'yan, ipadala mo sa Maynila, sampalin ko (But if the one behind it is of legal age already, then send them to Manila and I'll slap them)," he said.
According to Año, the Department of Education (DepEd) and the Philippine National Police (PNP) are already looking into the matter.
"Magbibigay po kami ng rekomendasyon. Maganda po talaga na tuluyan ng kaso ito para 'wag pong pamarisan (We will give a recommendation. It would be better if we really charge these people so the public won't copy them)," he said.
Duterte agreed with Año.
Meanwhile, President Duterte suggested that Facebook's content should be strictly monitored to prevent such incidents from happening again.
"Facebook is as wide as the universe. It can create... lahat (everything). It can create bastos (perverts). It can create trouble, wala nang magawa (and we can't do anything)," he said.
"It has opened a Pandora's box. Lumalabas na lahat ng kaputahan na maisip ng tao, na ilagay niya (Every nonsense that people can think of can be placed there). It has opened Pandora's box and I think that we should be stricter more often," he added.
The said module went viral last week after a Facebook user named Reyson Lee posted the photo on his account. He was wondering why such suggestive names made it to a printed module that was given to someone like his 16-year-old sister.
The module used names that played with words with sexual innuendos. These include: "Pining Garcia," "Abdul Salsalani," "Malou Wang" and "Tina Moran."
According to Education Secretary Leonor Briones, the controversial material was not produced by DepEd but said it was from a review center.
"It's not DepEd. It's a material produced by a review center for teachers for particular subjects. Nonetheless, that's still dirty language. It's not appropriate at all," she said.