MANILA - President Rodrigo Duterte on Friday said he believes that Pastor Apollo Quiboloy stopped one of the deadly quakes that jolted parts of Mindanao, after the latter "told it to stop."

"I believe in Pastor Quiboloy. When he said 'stop', eh kung nag-stop, eh di what's the trouble?" he said during an inauguration of a hotel in Davao.

"Stop it!" Duterte added, getting laughs from the audience.

The head of the Kingdom of Jesus Christ earlier said people should thank him for stopping the magnitude 6.6 tremor, that hit Mindanao in October, with his own words.

"Sabi ko, 'Lindol, huminto ka.' Huminto," Quiboloy said on the October 30 episode of "Give Us This Day," a weekly television show produced and aired by the pastor's religious sect.

(I said, "Earthquake, stop." It stopped.)

The 69-year-old pastor later became a subject of jokes and memes online.

Quiboloy rose to nationwide prominence in 2016 as Duterte's decades-long friend.

After winning the presidency, however, Quiboloy and Duterte allegedly had a spat after the President reportedly refused to accept the pastor's help in selecting Cabinet members.

The two mended ties reportedly after the 2019 midterm elections.

• Duterte aide apologizes to Quiboloy