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Malabon City Mayor Jeannie Sandoval at the recognition day of Malabon National High School in this photo on her Facebook page on May 24, 2024 (jeanniensandoval/Facebook)

Malabon City Mayor Jeannie Sandoval gained buzz anew after an online user posted a photo of student certificate that allegedly bore her image.

Reddit user dencioo02 on Thursday posted a picture of a certificate of recognition given to a Malabon resident on May 23, 2024 and captioned it with the following:

“Congrats, Mayor Jeannie, With Honors!!!!”

“Kada-recognition at moving up [or] graduation, mukha ni Jeannie ang nakalagay sa certificates,” the Redditor added with a skull face emoji.

Congrats Mayor Jeannie, With Honors!!!!byu/dencioo02 inPhilippines

The post has received 137 upvotes and 34 comments so far.

In the discussion thread, the uploader claimed that Sandoval’s image was also spotted on the back of medals before.

“Last year ata ‘yun, ‘yung mga medal, may mukha pa niya sa likod,” Redditor dencioo02 wrote.

Others expressed distaste over the city chief’s image in the student certificates.

“Ba’t naman po ganyan, HAHAHAAHA. Respeto naman sa tunay na nag-aral at nag-pursige para sa honors,” a Redditor commented.

“Hahaha, epal talaga ‘yan, sa tarpaulin mas malaki pa picture niya kaysa doon sa binabati niya. Tigas talaga ng mukha,” another Filipino wrote.

“Ito ‘yung mga award na nakakainis i-frame,” another Reddit user said.

Last year, the same scenario happened.

A user on the X (formerly Twitter) platform shared pictures of student certificates that previously had colored images of the mayor.

Some students and their families also criticized the certificates bearing Sandoval’s photo.

The Malabon city government previously said that that the certificate was intended to recognize “the hard work of the child as well as that of the family who worked tirelessly to ensure that their children have a promising future.”

“The new administration closely monitors the performance of the children because it is committed to [ensuring] that all public schools in Malabon are able to provide [the] quality education that our children deserve,” the local government unit (LGU) added.

Some Filipinos call instances of politicians placing their names and/or pictures in projects or other initiatives, especially tax-funded ones, as “epal” moves.