 Cheers to the Philippine Daily Inquirer for a two-part special report that discussed issues of governance and the budget system as well as the problems of the procurement law.
The first article explained the sources of corruption in the country. It also detailed several large-scale corruption cases, which included the national broadband network-ZTE deal, and the Ninoy Aquino International Airport project, among others. The first part also discussed how certain practices related to the budget and other resources—for instance the setting aside of special purpose funds—encourage corruption (April 1, “World Bank lists sources of corruption in RP”, p. B1).
The second article focused on the loopholes in the procurement law and how the budget system can be further improved. It discussed the need for the participation of Congress and civil society in pushing for reforms and strengthening implementing rules and regulations (“April 2, Sealing the loopholes in procurement law,” p. B4).
The two-part special was based on reports presented at the March 2008 Philippine Development Forum, “Accelerating Inclusive Growth and Deepening Fiscal Stability.”
Cheers to BusinessWorld for a two-part special on April 30 and May 1 explaining the complicated nature of minimum-wage setting.
The first part discussed how the almost yearly wage hikes are driving up the minimum wage in the Philippines, thus driving down the country’s competitiveness in attracting foreign investments. The report also detailed how both employers and employees oppose government’s wage-setting policies, which the article also tracked from 1951 to 1989 and compared it with those of other countries (“Frequent pay hikes making RP labor among the most costly”).
The second part of the series focused on the inability of the minimum wage law in the Philippines to protect workers from low pay. The report said the minimum wage—which should be regarded as the floor wage—has instead become the wage standard. This is because of the abundance of workers willing to work for pay below the minimum wage. BusinessWorld also noted the weakening of the country’s unions, which could have secured better working conditions for workers.
 Jeers to the Philippine Daily Inquirer for a biased report which drew the ire of the Presidential daughter.
The Inquirer reported that Evangeline Lourdes “Luli” Arroyo was one of at least 416 passengers inconvenienced after Asian Spirit’s May 1 flights to Boracay, Aklan were delayed for several hours (“Asian Spirit flights to Bora delayed 8 hrs,” May 2). Only two out of five planes usually bound for Caticlan and then to Boracay were then operational. Furthermore, passengers were dropped off at Kalibo after it was deemed unsafe to land at Caticlan airport at night, with Asian Spirit promising to cover their shuttle fees to Boracay.
The front-page story was accompanied by a photo of waiting passengers with a misleading caption. It said: “LULI WAS HERE” and ended with “…Luli was whisked off in a presidential chopper.”
The report did not give Arroyo’s side of the story. In a letter dated May 5, she denied taking a government vehicle and took the Inquirer to task for insinuating she had used her privilege to escape a predicament others had to endure (“A letter from Luli,” May 10).
Cheers to the Philippine Daily Inquirer for its series on the government’s campaign against the communist insurgency.
The reports featured accusations of military oppression from members of human rights and party-list groups. It distinguished itself from other stories on the same issue by using the statements of anonymous military sources who confirmed what critics of the government have been saying—that the Arroyo regime has a policy of condoning the extrajudicial killings of “enemies of the state”.
The reports achieved balance by focusing on the efforts of particular soldiers to combat insurgency through peaceful methods—for example by helping improve the livelihood of people in the provinces—to make the rebels, who tout themselves as providers of social justice, “redundant.”
It also included Supreme Court Chief Justice Reynato Puno’s views on the role of the writ of amparo in the prosecution and prevention of repression against government critics.
(“Political killings not official but an unintended policy,” May 9; “Rights workers’ lament: We’re treated like enemies of state,” May 10; “The ‘missing piece’ in gov’t anti-insurgency drive,” May 11; “Chief Justice: No magic bullet against assassins;” May 12).
Jeers to Malaya for a confusing report. Last April 28, it reported that House Speaker Prospero Nograles was bent on deferring House approval of the cheaper medicines bill unless President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo “gives an assurance that prices of medicines will go down.” (“House seeks assurance on cheaper medicines bill,” p. 1).
The report did not say why the House needed Arroyo’s assurance of lower medicine prices. Similar reports from other papers quoted Nograles differently. Nograles will defer approval of the final version until he is satisfied that the proposed bill could really reduce drug prices, according to The Philippine Star (“House to defer approval of Cheap Medicine Bill”). Nograles announced the suspension “after proponents of the measure in the House said the bill had been ‘drastically weakened’ with the removal in the bicameral conference committee of the provision creating a drug price regulation agency,” the Philippine Daily Inquirer reported (“Cheaper meds bill hits new snag”).
The reports used an April 27 press release from Nograles. What Nograles actually said, according to the release, was that the House of Representatives may defer the ratification until he “is personally satisfied that the law will guarantee cheaper cost of medicines” and that he will discuss the issue with Arroyo and Senate President Manuel Villar. “(W)e have to get the full assurance that if this is passed into law, it will really bring down the price of medicine. If we do not get this assurance, I think that it will be best to defer its ratification because I don’t see the point of passing a law that will not really serve its purpose” (“Nograles may endorse deferment of Cheap Med ratification,” April 27).
Cheers to the Philippine Daily Inquirer for providing another angle on the controversy over the Hanjin Subic Free Port condominiums. “Are Hanjin condos sitting on toxic site?” raised the issue of health safety for future tenants of the two high-rise buildings (April 30, p. A17).
South Korean company Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction Ltd. built the condos to house their employees in the Subic Bay rainforest. Media reports had focused for weeks on environmental concerns, on the condos’ being built in a protected forest, and the number of trees cut in the process.
The report said that the site could be hazardous or toxic as the activities of the past occupants, the United States Navy, could have resulted in widespread chemical contamination of the soil, groundwater, or sediment. The report provided comprehensive data, citing several studies and interviews from concerned parties which said that the place is polluted.
The report, however, just raised the possibility of contamination and did not directly say if the site indeed is hazardous. It could have helped if an independent study had been done or cited to actually prove or disprove the claim.
Jeers to The Philippine Star for passing off an advertisement as an ordinary news item. Last May 7, it published on page 3 what looked like a report on a celebrity endorser of a mobile telecommunications company. A closer look showed that it was all about the celebrity’s endorsement of the company. The item’s text and headline had the same font as the Star’s other reports. Neither did the paper bother to put any special marks or design on the item to distinguish it from its news stories (“Aga for Sun Cellular”).
Jeers to the Philippine Daily Inquirer for using its pages for self-promotion, this time through its continuing front-page coverage of the winners of a contest marking its 22nd anniversary.
The contest, sponsored by retail giant SM and Cebu Pacific airlines among others, involved readers’ sending in their wishes to the newspaper. The Inquirer selected 22 readers and their wishes for special attention in January for their loyalty to the paper.
Five pieces were published between March 16-April 15: “Teen helps ‘beautiful’ old man” (March 16); “Wish come true: 38th birthday for faith-full son” (March 23); followed by “Mang Ramon dies days after getting wish” (March 25, follow-up to March 16); “Wish come true: He’d rather read Inquirer than eat” (April 6); and “Wish come true for a wish come true” (April 13).
These winners were all covered in human interest or “slice of life” stories which were meant to be interesting, but these pieces all served to promote the Inquirer. Besides advertising the results of their own contest, two pieces (April 6 and 13) also praised the paper. The winners and/or their families were quoted as saying that the Inquirer was “food for the soul;” “has lived up to its name of delivering balanced news and fearless views;” has columns/columnists that are “entertaining, witty, educational, informative, inspiring, and worth reading;” “completes their day; a necessity, not a luxury;” among others.
Since the winners were ardent customers of the paper, that level of praise was not unexpected. But too much is too much.
Jeers to Malaya for forgetting fairness and balance. Malaya reported last May 7 that the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) had asked the Department of Agrarian Reform (DAR) to put lands owned by the Arroyos under the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP). The report got the CBCP’s side, as well as the supporting views of farmers’ advocate Task Force Mapalad and Akbayan Rep. Ana Theresita Hontiveros Baraquel.
But the report did not get the side of the Arroyo family. Instead, Malaya got the side of DAR undersecretary Gerundio Madueño who argued there is a process regarding the inclusion. Madueno’s one-sentence quote was at the end of the nine-paragraph report, or eight paragraphs after the other side had been presented (“CBCP asks DAR to place Arroyo lands under CARP: Agrarian reform summit bats for CARP extension”).
Cheers to BusinessWorld for its May 8 report explaining how more graduates may end up unemployed or underemployed because of talent mismatch—the disconnect between training and jobs.
Citing studies by the Employers’ Confederation of the Philippines and University of the Philippines School of Labor and Industrial Relations, the report discussed how the Philippines may again experience high single-digit unemployment rates due to talent mismatch. The report also noted how job generation in the country is still geared towards the agricultural sector-accounting for 41 percent of the 14.7 million jobs produced from 1980 to 2003. It added that while the manufacturing sector in other Southeast Asian countries is the source of quality jobs, in the Philippines this sector has generated only a million jobs in the last 22 years.
Cheers to the Philippines Free Press for belying government claims that the Philippines is a preferred choice of foreign investors in Asia. In its March 29 story “Investors’ Last Choice,” the Free Press noted the United Nations Conference on Trade and Development report showed that the Philippines scored the lowest amount of direct foreign investments (a total of $2.5 billion) and a growth of only 4.3 percent, or three percent smaller than official claims. The report noted that the central bank expects foreign investments to rise this year, but that they may be greatly affected by the US financial crisis.
But what is turning investors away more, according to the report, is official corruption. Citing what Philippine Business Forum Chairman and CEO Michael Clancy said, the report noted that 50 percent of investors’ cost of operations goes to bribes. The Free Press report also said the preference for Chinese loans by the Arroyo government over western investments is also hurting the economy.
Jeers to Teledyaryo for a biased report in favor of the Hanjin project last April 10. The report said that the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority officials maintained that Hanjin Heavy Industries & Construction Ltd. had not violated any laws and added that the controversy might discourage possible investors in the project. The report did not provide the views of other parties, particularly those against the project.
Jeers to TV Patrol World and Bandila for not verifying the identity of a man claiming to be Marine Capt. Nicanor Faeldon before airing an interview with someone who claimed to be him.
Last May 15, TV Patrol and Bandila aired a phone interview by ABS-CBN 2 reporter Ces Drilon with Faeldon, who has been in hiding since his escape from the Nov. 29 Manila Peninsula siege.
In the interview, the man claiming to be Faeldon detailed how he escaped during the siege and declared that no member of the media had helped him. He also criticized Senator Gringo Honasan for siding with the government and those Magdalo soldiers who had asked for a presidential pardon.
However, Faeldon’s lawyer Trixie Angeles denied that it was her client who had called ABS-CBN 2. Without disclosing the manner by which Faeldon reached her, Angeles told PJR Reports in a phone interview that Faeldon had asked her to deny that he was the man Drilon had interviewed. Angeles said that the station neither contacted her nor Faeldon’s family prior to the airing of the interview. ABS-CBN 2 talked to her only after she had issued a statement on the interview.
Jeers to Teledyaryo for promoting resorts in “reports” that were disguised ads.
The program featured Jed’s Island resort last April 17 in one of its news segments. Running for about a minute-and-a-half, the segment featured the resort’s amenities, activities, and range of fees.
It described the resort as a “cool” place, adding that people continuously flock to it. Video footage focused on the resort’s attractions, as viewers were invited by the management and resort guests to come over. The report also added that the resort provides summer jobs to underprivileged youth.
The April 17 report was just the latest in a series of Teledyaryo “reports” promoting resorts.
Jeers to 24 Oras for serving as a propaganda platform for GMA-7’s newest fantasy series, Dyesebel and for suggesting that the Manila Electric Company deliberately triggered a power interruption last April 29, during the premiere episode of the soap opera.
In the report, 24 Oras interviewed some Manila residents who expressed their frustration over the blackout that supposedly lasted for 10 to 15 minutes. Some of them were quoted as requesting GMA-7 for a replay of the pilot episode. The newscast also claimed that other parts of Manila had also suffered from blackouts.
24 Oras also interviewed Elpi Cuna, vice president of the Corporate Communication Department of Manila Electric Co. (Meralco), who explained that a power plant failure in Pangasinan had caused the blackout.
But the lowest point of the 24 Oras report was when the reporter mentioned that the pilot episodes of GMA-7’s previous soap operas were also disrupted by blackouts, as if implying that it was intentionally done to sabotage the shows. GMA-7’s rival network is ABS-CBN 2 which is owned by the Lopez family. The Lopez family also controls Meralco, the country’s dominant electric distribution company.
Jeers to 24 Oras for devoting so much airtime not only to the fight between Emmanuel “Manny” Pacquiao and Mexican boxer Juan Manual Marquez, but also to nearly everything connected with it.
Not content with an 11-minute report that gave its viewers a blow-by-blow account of the 12-round fight last March 17, 24 Oras also had reports on the Filipino singers who sang before the fight started, the Filipino personalities who watched the fight, the reactions of Pacquiao fans across the country, President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo’s greetings to Pacquiao, and the welcome ceremonies Pacquiao received on his return to the Philippines.
There were also interviews with Pacquiao’s family members and friends. A number of reports on the controversial decision that favored Pacquaio were also aired, as well as reports on what boxing analysts and fans thought of the fight.
In its November 2007 issue, the PJR Report had already noted the station’s penchant for putting so muc attention on Pacquaio, a GMA-7 talent, when he fought Marco Antionio Barrera (“Money on Manny?”).
Cheers to the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism for unraveling the extent and repercussions of the appointment of ineligible political appointees under the Arroyo administration. The two-part report (“New CSC chief faces pack of ineligible bureaucrats” and “Malacañang is no. 1 agency with excess exec hires—CSC”) detailed the rampant “invasion” of career service positions by Arroyo political allies and its effect on the bureaucracy and governance. The report was published April 24 ((http://www.pcij.org/stories/2008/ineligible-bureaucrats.html) and 25 (http://www.pcij.org/stories/2008/ineligible-bureaucrats4.html).
Cheers to the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism for detailing how the Arroyo government has increasingly limited access to public information. “Access to data held by state agencies not only remains limited, it has become nil in some cases, apparently because of the current Senate scrutiny of particular government projects,” according to PCIJ’s March 31 report (“Gov’t curbs access to information amid senate scrutiny of projects,” http://www.pcij.org/stories/2008/access-to-info.html). The report’s findings were based on a recent PCIJ story on official development assistance projects.
Cheers to Newsbreak for its two-part report which exposed how the awarding of lands to farmer-beneficiaries through the Comprehensive Agrarian Reform Program (CARP) is sabotaged.
The report said that cattle- raising is not just a status symbol for land owners in Masbate. “Landowners develop ranches to evade agrarian reform” (http://newsbreak.com.ph/index.php?option=com_content&task= view&id=4327&Itemid=88889066) stressed that it has also been used to exempt their lands from CARP.
The second part of the report (“LGU’s help keep agri lands out of farmers’ reach”, http://newsbreak.com.ph/index.php?option=com_content&task= view&id=4344&Itemid=88889066) focused on the role of local government units in the reclassification of agricultural lands into commercial and industrial use.
Cheers to Newsbreak for its survey that looked into the political profile, educational background, and professional training of provincial governors in the country.
While a majority of the governors (37 out of 58 respondents, or 63.79%) still belong to political clans, the report “Most governors still from political clans, but with varied trainings” (http://newsbreak. com.ph/index.php? option=com_content &task= view&id=4394&Itemid=88889066, April 22) revealed that many local officials had practiced their professions first before entering politics—a digression “from the college-to-politics path that many members of political dynasties had been traditionally known to take.”
According to the report, 45 out of the 58 respondents had practiced as businessmen, doctors, engineers, professors, and lawyers before pursuing a political career.
Looking at the educational attainment of the governors, the report noted that a majority of them (70. 68%) have bachelor’s degree, while those who have master’s and doctorate degrees accounted for 17.24 % and 8.62 % respectively (http://www.newsbreak.com.ph/democracyandgovernance/Profile_Of_Governors.htm).
Cheers to MindaNews for a detailed article on the meaning of the March 18, 1968 Jabidah Massacre (“40 years after Jabidah, Moro struggle continues”). The report, published on the 40th anniversary of the massacre, featured several public figures from Mindanao who related the incident to the national government’s policies and treatment of the Mindanao people through the years (http://www.minda news.com/index.php?option =com_content&task= view&id=4032&Itemid=75).
The Jabidah massacre, in which government forces supposedly killed at least 26 Muslim youth recruited for a mission to “liberate” Sabah, helped inspire the Bangsamoro “struggle for self-determination,” the report explained.
[ Jeer of the Month ]
Jeers to the Philippine press for again displaying its parochialism despite the tragedy in Burma, which has been in the news since cyclone ‘Nargis’ hit the low-lying river delta around Yangon, the country’s biggest city, last May 2. The cyclone wiped out many communities, killing over 100,000 people.
Despite the ruling junta’s restrictions against media coverage of the disaster, international media still managed to report on it. A look at the Philippine media’s coverage from May 7 to May 20, however, reveals that while the Philippine press did use the reports generated by the wire agencies, it failed to provide the analyses needed that would have helped Filipinos understand why the junta has been blocking foreign relief efforts, which in turn could have led to a second look at Burma’s membership in the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and the Philippines’ own policies towards that country.
Most of the reports that were published in the Philippine Daily Inquirer, the Philippine Star, and the Manila Bulletin were sourced from wire agencies Agence France-Presse, Reuters, and the Associated Press. The pieces Filipino journalists wrote were mostly columns and editorials, and only PCIJ (“Still reeling from military junta, Burma a mess after cycle,” May 6) had a first hand account of what is happening in Burma in the aftermath of the cyclone.
Both Burma and the Philippines are members of the ASEAN. Burma’s Asean membership was in fact brokered by the Philippines during the term of President Fidel V. Ramos. The junta’s behavior in the aftermath of the calamity—its blocking foreign relief efforts for example—should have been the occasion for the Philippine press to look into the wisdom of Asean’s engagement policy, which hopes to encourage the junta to democratize that country. No such effort took place. |
