The press fights back; files petition vs govt efforts to stifle media

Last March 8, the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) joined other media groups and some of the most prominent print and broadcast journalists in the Philippines in filing a petition before the Court of Appeals restraining executive officials from muzzling the media. (A small note: I work for CMFR and serves as the assistant editor for Philippine Journalism Review Reports or PJR Reports, CMFR's flagship media-monitoring publication.)

The petitioners asked the Court of Appeals to prohibit the respondents from "imposing any form of content-based prior restraint on the press, be it formal or informal, direct or in the form of disguised or thinly veiled threats of administrative sanction or criminal prosecution." The petition stressed that "only a court, with its accompanying due process safeguards, may impose content-based prior restraints, when the grounds therefor are duly proved."

Named respondents in the petition are Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, Department of Justice secretary Raul Gonzalez, Philippine National Police Chief Director General Arturo Lomibao, and National Telecommunications Commission Chairman Ronald Solis.

Aside from CMFR, media groups that signed the petition are:

Philippine Press Institute, National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, Center for Community Journalism and Development, Newsbreak magazine, Probe Productions, and ABS-CBN News and Public Affairs.

Among the journalists who also signed the petition are Chit Estella, editor of the PJR Reports; Sheila Coronel of PCIJ; Maria Ressa, Vice-President for News and Current Affairs of ABS-CBN Broadcasting Network; Jessica Soho, Vice President for News and News Director of GMA-7; Tina Monzon-Palma of ABS-CBN News Channel (who is also a CMFR board member); Marites Vitug of Newsbreak, Ed Lingao, Vice President for Operations of ABC-5; Ricky Carandang of ANC and Arnold Clavio of GMA-7 and dzBB.

In a press conference at Newsdesk today, the petitioners released a statement to the media.

Journalists file petition against government efforts to stifle media

For the first time since martial law, a broad range of media organizations and journalists have banded together to file a petition in court, questioning government efforts to restrain media reporting and intimidate journalists.

In a petition filed on March 8, 36 print and broadcast journalists and nine media groups led by the Philippine Press Institute (PPI), the national organization of newspaper publishers, the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines and the News and Current Affairs division of network giant ABS-CBN, asked the Court of Appeals to prohibit executive-branch officials from censoring the media.

These officials, the petition said, acted beyond their authority and violated the free-press guarantee in the Bill of Rights by imposing content-based prior restraints on the press. The petitioners therefore asked the court for a temporary restraining order and an injunction that would stop these officials from imposing or threatening to impose such restraints.

In the petition, the media groups asserted that “only a court, with its accompanying due process safeguards, may impose content-based prior restraints.” They specifically cited Executive Secretary Eduardo Ermita, the heads of the Philippine National Police (PNP), the Department of Justice (DOJ), and the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) for attempts to stop, ban or censor the publication or airing of speech that allegedly incites or tends to incite to sedition.

The media groups also asked the court to prohibit the heads of these four state agencies and other persons acting under their authority from imposing any prior restraint on media content, whether formal or informal or “in the form of disguised or thinly veiled threats of administrative sanction or criminal prosecution.”

While Philippine journalists have defied the restraints, “the threat of official intervention – in the form of administrative sanction or criminal prosecution – is just as damaging to a free press as the fact of it,” the media petition said.

The petition cited the warnings to the media made by, among others, PNP Chief Arturo Lomibao, who said in a press forum on Feb. 25 that the police may take over newspapers “if they do not follow the standards and the standards are if they will contribute to instability in government.”

More specifically, the media practitioners asked the court to annul NTC circulars that prohibit the broadcast media from airing news and commentary that is “subversive” “tends” to incite to treason, rebellion, or sedition, or which constitute “rebellious/terrorist propaganda, comments, information, interviews and other similar or related materials.”

“The NTC does not have any lawful power, authority or jurisdiction to prohibit these things, much less to judge what is subversive (when the crime of subversion has long been repealed), what merely ‘tends’ to propose or incite sedition or rebellion (whatever that means to the NTC), and what constitutes ‘rebellious/terrorist propaganda, comments and the like (whatever that means to the NTC)’,” the petition said.

The petitioners include the top anchors and news managers of erstwhile network rivals, ABS-CBN and GMA-7, among them, Maria Ressa, Jessica Soho, Arnold Clavio, Ricky Carandang, and Pia Hontiveros.

The other media groups that signed the petition include the multi-awarded Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, Newsbreak magazine, and the independent TV company, Probe Productions. The Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility and the Center for Community Journalism and Development, media NGOs engaged in media development work, signed as well. So did the College of Mass Communication of the University of the Philippines.

“The dangers of unreviewable administrative sanctions imposing prior restraints on the press are as ancient as dictators, the petition said. “We seek the intervention of this Honorable Court to stop the use of the strong arm of the law to exclude speech protected by the Constitution.”

For questions please refer to:

Jose Torres Jr.
National Union of Journalists of the Philippines
Address: 105-A Scout Castor St., Brgy. Laging Handa, Quezon City
Telefax: 411-7768
Email: nujphil@gmail.com
Website: http://www.nujp.org

Sheila Coronel
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
3/F Criselda II Bldg., 107 Scout de Guia St., Quezon City 1104
Tel: 410-4768 to 69 / 929-3117
Fax: 929-3571
Email: pcij@pcij.org
Website: http://www.pcij.org

Rachel Khan
Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR)
Address: 2/F Ateneo Professional Schools-Salcedo,
#130 HV dela Costa St.,
Makati City 1227
Tel: 894-1326 / 894-1314 / 840-0903
Telefax: 840-0889
Email: staff@cmfr-phil.org
Website: http://www.cmfr-phil.org