Warning signals
on press freedom

As a professional journalist, I can state categorically that what I saw Thursday afternoon at the finale of the Makati standoff was a very significant perception of what could be forthcoming insofar as press freedom is concerned.

Later, the justification by DILG Secretary Rony Puno that the mediamen had mounted a sort of obstruction of justice for repeatedly failure to heed the call for them to vacate the Peninsula , sounded scary.

For that matter, I contend that the presence of journalists may have prevented a bloodbath. The assaulting force apparently were prevented from using their overwhelming force to destroy Trillanes and the few Magdalo members inside the hotel.

Besides, the mediamen were not asking for the special privilege of not getting caught in the crossfire had it taken place. They knew the risk. And simply took it as part of the game.

What caught my attention was that the mediamen, including news hens, were forced to squat their way forward instead of just getting out of the hotel lobby on their two feet. And, once outside, they were ordered gruffly to stay put in the holding center. Several were handcuffed with plastic manacles. Especially the ABS-CBN television crew.

In short, they were treated as suspects in an ongoing crime. They were not even told what the charges were to justify their being brought to Camp Bagong Diwa in Taguig.

A PNP spokesman was caught over television declaring that the only reason the mediamen were to be hauled off to Bagong Diwa was for processing. Asked further the reason for it, he just muttered – “those are the orders.”

The fact that Puno, himself, used the term obstruction of justice was reinforced further by Defense Secretary Gilbert Teodoro who lamely tried the excuses that not all members of media were known to the lawmen. Thus, the need to verify their identities.

What made the excuses ridiculous was the fact that many of mediamen there were themselves veteran police and PNP reporters. So with the TV crew.

That's why, I suspect, that the government simply wanted to send signals to mediamen that there are limits to their coverage of the news. The same government went to town with their use of media to send their messages of “hope” and “peace” sans any warning against media that they were taking sides in the controversy.

That's why it is possible that this is already part of a government policy.

And that is what makes Thursday's incidents dangerous and calls for more vigilance by mass media. Press Freedom is actually at stake here. And, as pointed out by Vergel Santos of the Philippine Press Institute, the police seemed unaware that the mediamen were at the hotel to fulfill their work. Covering an event from a close range.

The days ahead will tell whether my suspicions are correct. That may substantiate the fears that the elimination of countryside journalists may actually be implementing state policy, the same way that extra-judicial killings are believed to reflect the thinking of the state.

On a completely different story. Few local Catholics are aware that a big group of youthful pilgrims from Cebu and Dumaguete are arriving this morning in Kabankalan City where they will call on Kabankalan Bishop P. Buzon.

Later, the pilgrims will proceed to Hinigaran, the first stop in the Bacolod Diocese. There they will conduct a popular mission and take their lunch afterwards. Later, they will stop in San Enrique to call on the parish priest and undertake a brief popular mission.

The group will proceed to Bacolod in the late afternoon and attend a mass to be celebrated by Msgr. Vic Rivas, Diocesan Vicar, at the San Sebastian Cathedral. They will be hosted by families of neo-catechumenal communities of Bata, Hua Ming, Montevista, Bakyas and other areas of Bacolod .

It was not clear yet whether they will also be joined by pilgrims from Zamboanga.

This is a movement that is worth watching, rather than the march to the Manila Pen by the Magdalo Group of Senator A. Trillanes Thursday.*

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