governance, public health

Notes on: What next? #Covid19 #TerrorLaw #Protest

July 19, 2020 by
N

We all already agree that the Duterte government’s handling of this public health crisis is probably one of the worst in the world—and certainly the worst in Southeast Asia—as both the facts and numbers reveal.

But this government is much much worse. It has used this pandemic and to declare de facto martial law. The policies on the Bayanihan We Heal As One Act are the tip of the iceberg; what is worse than the words that are there is how it is implemented on the ground, where military might and police power are king. We of course had this coming: we watched the past four years as Duterte appointed military men into the Cabinet, one after the other; we watched as he emboldened the police by telling them to kill, and condoning their abuses; we watched as he jailed Leila de Lima, unseated CJ Sereno, jailed activists on trumped-up charges; we watched as the body count grew.

This pandemic was all Duterte’s government needed to get all its other unjust, extrajudicial policies to happen. Cancel the ABS-CBN franchise based on the President’s personal gripe? Check. Pass the anti-terror law that will legalize the tagging of activism as terrorism among the violation of our rights? Check. Put Charter Change back on the table? Check. Allow the Aerotropolis airport in Bulacan to push through despite displacing fisherfolk and it environmental repercussions? Implement the jeepney phaseout that will disenfranchise thousands of jeepney drivers who are being made to go into debt for a modern vehicle in this time of crisis? Check. Disallow protests, and arrest without warrants any group, no matter how small, that dares do a protest? Check.

The latter is of course key: the past five months, we have seen how incompetent and violent, how shameless and thoughtless this government is. At any other time we would be out on the streets, raising a fist. In the time of pandemic, we are disallowed from doing so, and with a Terror Law now in place, acts of resistance like that can easily be construed as acts of terrorism. The fear is valid, but so is the anger.

Especially since it get worse. Duterte’s propaganda machinery is so head of us, with it’s game so strong, that it has been able to control the narrative of this pandemic and the government’s contingent abuses.

Click here for the rest of it.

social / media

On freedom of the press and the ABS-CBN franchise renewal

July 10, 2020 by
O

by Rep. Edcel Lagman

The freedom of the press is an overriding issue in the long-drawn renewal of the legislative franchise of ABS-CBN Corporation.

The freedom of the press, which is an integral component of the freedom of expression, is accorded primacy in the constellation of civil liberties which are guaranteed by the Bill of Rights.

Notwithstanding occasional alleged violations by ABS-CBN in its operations, the decision of the Joint Committees on the issues of “biased reporting” and “meddling in politics” should take into consideration the relevance of the following jurisprudential pronouncements:

1. Chavez v. Gonzalez (G.R. No. 168338, February 15, 2008) penned by Chief Justice Reynaldo Puno:

“In this jurisdiction it is established that freedom of the press is crucial and so inextricably woven into the right to free speech and free expression, that any attempt to restrict it must be met with an examination so critical that only a danger that is clear and present would be allowed to curtail it.

Read More
human rights, peace and order

A Field Guide to the Anti-Terrorism Law Without Preempting the Courts on the Issue of its Constitutionality

July 6, 2020 by
A

by Adolf Azcuna

It is Rep Act No 11479 signed into law on July 3, 2020 and effective after publication for 15 days in the Official Gazette or newspaper of general circulation in the country. The Anti-Terrorism Council and the Secretary of Justice are to draw up the IRR or implementing rules in 90 days after the law’s effectivity.

It repeals or replaces the Human Security Act of 2007 which was allegedly largely unused because of the heavy fines provided against law enforcers who violated its safeguards.

It adopts a policy against terrorism and seeks to defend the nation against it. It then defines what constitutes terrorism, penalizes proposals to commit it, terrorist training, funding and recruitment activities and membership in designated terrorist organizations. It covers foreign terrorist activities that have links to the Philippines.

It creates an Anti-Terrorism Council composed of Executive Officials that will oversee the Act’s implementation.

It provides for an elaborate system of surveillance including wiretapping by state agents of suspected terrorists upon directive or permission from the Anti-Terrorism Council with the approval of the Court of Appeals, for a period of 60 days extendible for another 30 days.

It allows arrests without judicial warrants and detention without filing of charges in court for a period of 14 days extendible for another 10 days in the name of fighting terrorism.

And it removes the heavy fines on law enforcers if they transgress the law’s safeguards and instead provides for imprisonment of up to 12 years.

The thrust of the objections and of petitions to declare all or parts of the law invalid are or are likely to be—

Read More
social / media

Not all attacks against the media are done with a gun: on the ABS-CBN franchise

July 5, 2020 by
N

I need to warn you folks that this might be kinda long.

Before I left for Iraq in 2003, I was asked repeatedly WHY, when I didn’t have to (I was in Current Affairs, I wasn’t even in News), and besides, why tempt fate (Afghanistan was just two years earlier, and we almost failed to make it out of that one).

Some even asked if it was for the hazard pay (“Ang laki siguro ng binayad sa iyo ano?”) No I did not get any hazard pay at all. Returning after a month in Iraq, I just collected my one month salary as a regular Manila-based producer. Was it the “overwhelming” support that we got during these deployments? Hardly. I bought a second hand flak jacket in Quiapo using my own money, and borrowed steel helmets from the Philippine Marines. I borrowed some money from friends and colleagues to add to our suicide budget (Thank you David Jude Sta. Ana!) and my wife also pitched in to help. In Baghdad, rival GMA’s Howie Severino was even kind enough to give me his leftover Iraqi money before they returned to Manila (I have no idea how Howie liquidated THAT expense)

I did not do it for ABS-CBN. I did it because it was something that had to be done, And sometimes, you really believe it has to be done by you. That is why it pains me whenever people throw around that “bayaran” and “presstitute” label so glibly just because they disagree with what you have to say.

Is the profession perfect? Far from it. ABS-CBN was a perfect example of our many imperfections. We fought our internal battles more times than I would care to remember, from problems with politics to problems with priorities. And in the end, I really learned to appreciate the people I worked with – the colleagues who stood by us in our many battles, and some of our immediate bosses who covered for us, or simply turned a blind eye, when we simply refused to obey. Loyalty to your profession needs to trump other loyalties. Sound noble, right? Well, sometimes, or perhaps many times, we lose our battles.

The point is to know that these are battles that we need to keep fighting.

Read More
social / media

On the Ressa verdict

June 20, 2020 by
O

by Andrew Fornier

Well. I think we all saw that coming, much as we hoped against hope that the verdict would be different somehow. I guess it was like walking into a McDonald’s and expecting to find Chickenjoy on sale. I mean, there are some very specific elements that would have to converge for it to happen, and it isn’t exactly impossible, but you wouldn’t be the least bit surprised to come up empty-handed.

I should preface this by saying that I’m not a Ressa fan. (This is important.) I have little patience for the kind of journalism she has represented, in which the reporter is a celebrity of greater importance than the stories she has to tell. There’s a constant undercurrent of arrogance that oozes from the paragraphs of Rappler, particularly from its opinion pieces, which seems content to berate the common citizen for their “ignorance” and proclaim, in all self-righteousness, that there is only one way to look at the news.

Read More