We are issuing this statement on the harassment of a FOCAP member.
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Statement on Harassment of FOCAP Member
The Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines condemns in the strongest terms the manhandling and detention of one of its members, Francis Malasig of the EPA photo agency in Taguig city Sunday night.
Malasig went to the Taguig University late Sunday to check reports of an unusual gathering of people outside the university on the eve of the May 10 elections.
Arriving at the scene, he said he saw people in and outside the university compound and asked permission from two guards to get in. Inside, he said he saw people in classrooms distributing blank IDs. At that point, some people, clearly belligerent toward him, stopped him from taking pictures and ordered him to leave. He explained that he had permission and showed proper COMELEC press accreditation.
Sensing danger, he headed out of the compound but was stopped by the same group. He said some of them hit and manhandled him and forcibly brought him to a local police station. He inquired from a police officer why he was being held against his will. He got no clear answer.
He was later transferred to the Taguig police station, where an investigation officer allowed him to go after two hours of detention when nobody showed up to file any complaint against him.
The FOCAP views this as a clear case of harassment of a properly identified news photographer on a legitimate news assignment.
This is a clear violation of press freedom at a time when open coverage of the national elections is most crucial.
We demand that Taguig officials and the Philippine National Police investigate and prosecute those responsible for this blatant transgression of Malasig’s rights.
ARMM Governor Zaldy Ampatuan and Andal Ampatuan Jr. - photo used in the DOJ investigation PHOTO BY RAISSA ROBLES
Acting Justice Secretary Alberto Agra exonerated Muslim Mindanao Governor Zaldy Ampatuan of the Ampatuan, Maguinandao massacre because he said Governor Zaldy was not there at the scene of the crime.
Governor Zaldy had a plane ticket and cellphone records to prove this, he said.
Please read below portions of Kenny Dalandag’s affidavit that formed part of the basis for the arrest of Gov. Zaldy. I did not get this from the lawyers of the slain journalists’ families. In fact lawyer Harry Roque declined to give it to me. I got it from deep within the government bureaucracy.
This morning, Justice Secretary Agra defended his move on radio saying:
Para imaintain yung impartiality ng pagreview ng mga dokumento at records, hindi ho naman kinokonsulta yung nagpahayag ng mga dokumento.
Kayat bagamat nagkaroon ako ng ilang discussion tungkol dito sa update tungkol sa Maguindanao massacre, ang naging basehan ko lang po ng aking resolution ay yung mga dokumento at mga ebidensiya na nasa Department t of Justice. Wala na pong iba.
This is the rough translation of what Agra said:
In order to maintain the the impartiality of the review of the documents and records, one does not consult those who gave the documents.
And so, while I had some discussion about the update on the Maguindanao massacre, the basis of my resolution were the documents and the evidence at the Department of Justice. Nothing else.
From his statements, it was clear he did not make an effort to talk to Kenny Dalandag. But last weekend Agence France Presse quoted Agra as saying:
“There was no proof of conspiracy and there was proof of an alibi.”
How did he come to that conclusion without talking to Kenny Dalandag?
Did he even consider Kenny Dalandag’s affidavit (read portions below)? Because if he didn’t he may be laying the predicate to exonerate more Ampatuans.
Nearly eight years ago I asked President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, “I’m sure a lot of women are dying to ask you this question.”
“And since you are not a widow, they would like to ask you this question. You don’t have to answer this if you don’t want to, but a lot of women are dying to know – do you still have sex?”
The 55-year-old mother of three replied “Plenty” – and gave a toothy smile.
Last January 22, when she hosted a a surprise dinner for 23 officers and members of the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) I asked her a milder personal question about her hair. Now I’m not so sure if her reluctant reply pertained to my question eight years ago or two Fridays ago.
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo and FOCAP
During the hour-long dinner, Mrs Arroyo was at her gracious best but she was not all that candid. I must say, it took all of our reportorial skills to get her to talk about her former college student and now leading presidential contender Senator Benigno “Noynoy” Aquino III. She refused to talk about her party’s presidential standard bearer Gilbert Teodoro or about her feelings towards the Ampatuans – her long-time allies now accused of murdering 57 people including 30 journalists.
The ease with which she talked to reporters vanished in 2005 when wiretapped tapes of her, suggesting she was trying to rig her 2004 poll victory by a million votes, leaked out.
During her dinner some of that ease returned as she talked about the presidential palace, her girlhood and her Palace chef. Only to vanish when she refused to answer many questions she deemed “political” or which asked about her “feelings”.
Still, the occasion gave me a momentary glimpse of the power and the pomp of the presidency, its lonely isolation, and the woman who was determined to hold on to it for as long as she could.
I did not get any hint she was ready to clear out her desk by June 30 when her term ends.
At short notice. An invitation to dine with her, even at several hours’ notice, was highly unusual and one I seized at a moment’s notice. She had not seen FOCAP since 2007. A press conference in 2008 was abruptly canceled after we were told she would only talk about the economy and would not entertain political questions.
I was curious why the President wanted to meet us on the same day she waved goodbye to the remains of her press secretary, Cerge Remonde.
Her terms for engaging the foreign press quickly became evident. At the entrance to the presidential palace, the guards impounded all tape recorders and cameras on orders of the palace media relations office. It was a first for many of the journalists, including me, who have covered Palace events in three previous presidencies.
The media handlers later explained that no tape recorders and cameras were allowed because it was a strictly social event. A Palace photographer would snap photos. The confiscation disoriented me somewhat because we were informed earlier that while there was no formal Q and A, the President “may answer questions”.
Didn’t she want to be quoted correctly? And it would have been bad manners for us to scribble throughout the meal.
It turned out alright in the end, because someone else, who asked to remain unnamed, enabled me to put together almost the entire dinner conversation. Besides, Mrs Arroyo never told us it was off the record.
I wasn’t going to write about poll automation just yet. I thought what President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo told the foreign press corps last Friday, January 22 was old hat, until I saw the presidential palace story on the dinner:
PGMA assures foreign media there will be no failure of election
President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo last night assured foreign correspondents there will be no failure of elections in May.
In a dinner she hosted for the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) at the Palace, the President said she was assured by the Commission on Elections (Comelec) that it is doing its best to complete the automated poll system before May. She said all the funds necessary for holding the national elections have been disbursed.
That’s funny. I did not come away from the Palace dinner feeling reassured that the automation was going great guns.
Oliver Teves of Associated Press shakes hands with President Arroyo while I (in brown coat) look on; left foreground is FOCAP president Jim Gomez; behind Jim is Dana Batnag of Jiji Press; on right background is Zhao Jiemin of Xinhua News Agency - PHOTO courtesy of Malacanang Palace press office
In fact I felt more apprehensive because of what Mrs Arroyo told us.
When I asked her – “Maam, are you personally worried” – about the automation?
Her reply did not give comfort. First she said, “Um”, and she looked up at the ceiling. Then she said, more like talking to herself, “I’m worried. I’m worried, but I – I have to go by what the Comelec said.”
Dear readers, tell me if I’m being paranoid by reading more than what the President really told us.
Help me out here by reading for yourself what President Arroyo (GMA) said – word for word – on poll automation during our dinner . I would like to thank a colleague in FOCAP for providing me with the specific quotes reprinted below:
FOCAP MEMBER: THERE ARE CONCERNS ABOUT THE AUTOMATION PROCESS.
GMA: Ya, thats why I called a national security council meeting. Because we needed to ask Comelec.
FOCAP MEMBER: ARE WE STILL ON SCHEDULE?
GMA:Ya, that’s what the Comelec said.
FOCAP MEMBER: WHAT ASPECT ARE YOU WORRIED ABOUT, OF AUTOMATION?
GMA: Well, it’s not been tested. So we expressed the concern that everybody —
FOCAP MEMBER (ME): MAAM, ARE YOU PERSONALLY WORRIED?
GMA: Um – I’m worried. I’m worried, but I – I have to go by what the Comelec said.
FOCAP MEMBER: WHAT IF IT FAILS?
GMA: They said it might fail in some – some areas. But it cannot, but not nationally.
FOCAP MEMBER: WHAT ABOUT THE AUTOMATION ARE YOU WORRIED ABOUT?THE COUNTING,THE–
GMA: I don’t know, I don’t know. It’s just that –
FOCAP MEMBER (ME): YOU’RE UNEASY
GMA: I don’t know. Like all of you. Like all of you. It’s more –
FOCAP MEMBER: WHAT STEPS ARE YOU DOING TO AVOID A FAILURE OF ELECTIONS?
GMA: We have to support the Comelec in everything they want to do. It’s their primary responsiblity but we’re suporting them. That’s why we called a National Security Council meeting. To ask them what they would need. We’ve made the budget tthat they need available.
FOCAP MEMBER: LET’S KEEP OUR FINGERS CROSSED.
GMA: They said they’re not entertaining a failure of elections
FOCAP MEMBER: NANDON BA ANG (IS THERE A )BACKUP PLAN IF EVER?
GMA: You know I can’t be their spokesman. You have to ask them. But then they made a presentation. What about failure of elections. They said there may be some but only in isolated areas, but not nationwide.
FOCAP MEMBER: SO WHAT DID THEY SAY IN SOME ISOLATED AREAS
GMA: Same as now. It happens. So they have their mechanism. But it doesnt affect the national anymore.
FOCAP MEMBER: THEY ASSURED YOU IT WON’T BE MASSIVE FAILURE
GMA: That’s what they said. They’re not entertaining national failure of elections, maybe in some isolated areas but not nationwide.
FOCAP MEMBER: DID THEY MENTION TO YOU ABOUT THE POSSIBILITY OF PARALLEL MANUAL COUNT?
GMA: They did not say.
FOCAP MEMBER (DANA BATNAG OF JIJI PRESS: – YOU SAID COMELEC IS NOT ENTERTAINING THE POSSIBILITY. DOES THAT MEAN THE NATIONAL GOVERNMENT IS NOT PREPARING FOR THE POSSIBLITY OF A FAILURE OF ELECTIONS? OR ARE THERE PREPARATIONS?
GMA: As far as we are concerend, we would rather prepare to help Comelec succeed.
FOCAP MEMBER: IN CASE IT HAPPENS
GMA: You know, they said it’s not going to happen. So we take their word for it.
Since our Friday dinner, pronouncements from the Comelec have made me even warier.
Fidel Ramos won in 1992 with only 5,342,321 votes.
Joseph Estrada won in 1998 with 10,722,295 votes or 31.39% of registered voters then.
In 2004, Mrs Arroyo was credited with 12,905,808 votes or 29.64% of registered voters.
Given these trends, we should not be worried with an automation failure rate that could affect as much as 14.4 million voters?
There are other things I’m worried about. When I was listening to Wednesday’s Comelec and Smartmatic presentation before Senator Francis Escudero’s Senate committee, I realized that the automation left very little margin for error as far as ballot distribution is concerned.
Let me explain. In all our elections, Comelec only had to send out the number of ballots for each precinct nationwide plus a little extra for spoilage.
Now, because all the local candidates’ names from congressman down to councilor are printed at the back of each ballot, Comelec has to be very precise in delivering to every area.
In Quezon City for instance, ballots for District 1 should only go to District 1 and not anywhere else. Otherwise, the name of the candidates for congressman would be wrong. For the same reason, ballots for Quezon City cannot go to Manila since the names of the candidates for mayors and city councilors would be wrong.
For the first time, Comelec would have to practice that kind of precision especially in far-flung areas.
And some candidates could take advantage by finding ways for ballots, intended for certain areas where they are weak, to be diverted somewhere else.
From what I have seen of candidates’ behavior in previous polls, I am certain there are candidates who are even now trying to find ways to game the system for to their own advantage.
If you want to know more about what President Arroyo told FOCAP – about her hair, the grade she gave her former student Senator Noynoy Aquino, about life in the presidential palace, etc – click on the link below:
Before Martial Law was imposed in Maguindanao, the Ampatuans were known worldwide as the prime suspects in the deliberate liquidation of 57 people, 30 of them journalists. This has set a world record for the worst one-day killing of media men in peace time, while covering a democratic exercise.
To understand how stupefied many of us at the Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (FOCAP) were at the sudden declaration of Martial Law to catch the Ampatuans, let me give this background.
For many FOCAP members, Filipino rebels are just a phone call away. It is at times easier for us to reach by mobile phone a communist or Muslim rebel leader than a high government official.
And for those covering rebels since 1987, the Ampatuans have never been in our radar. In fact, top officials of the Moro National Liberation Front used to tell me that they felt very aggrieved that the Muslim autonomy they had won with the blood of their warriors was handed on a silver platter by President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo to a member of the Ampatuan clan which had continuously opposed them during the Marcos dictatorship.
If the Ampatuans are indeed rebels, they seemed to be a different species altogether.By being suspected of killing journalists en masse just before launching their rebellion, they have ensured that the media will boycott and even be hostile towards them. What strange rebels indeed.
Our years of covering and writing about the Muslim and communist insurgencies have taught us that rebels don’t as a rule liquidate journalists because it is not in their creed and not to their advantage. Even the Abu Sayyaf, branded terrorist by the United States and the European Union, has merely held hostage and robbed members of FOCAP and other media men who came to cover them. It has yet to behead a reporter deliberately, knock on wood.
Many FOCAP members who regularly take the red-eye flight to central Mindanao to cover the separatist Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) know the reputation of the Ampatuans. They are the king of the hill, the warlords, the overlords, the one whose 15-car speeding convoy you avoid on the highway if you don’t want your car to end up like a pretzel.
Foreign and local journalists take their life in their hands whenever they cover in the Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao (ARMM). Do you know that Manila’s insurance firms have attached a permanent rider to life and accident insurance products that says – death due to non-natural causes is not covered if this occurs in the ARMM area?
It is perhaps in this context that one can better appreciate the emotional outburst during the December 7, 2009 briefing of veteran FOCAP member Tress Martelino-Reyes, correspondent for the Japanese news agency Nikkei. Tress is not a parachute journalist. She once reported for the broadsheet Manila Chronicle.
To understand why she mentioned the phrase “sitting on their ass,” listen to this exchange between her and Secretary Puno:
Some people have taken strong exception to the fact that FOCAP has issued a very strong political statement against the imposition of Martial Law in Maguindanao. Members of FOCAP are not elected by the people, one critic said.
True. But the press is a strange sort of animal in the Philippines, specifically protected by the Constitution’s Bill of Rights, which states: “No law shall be passed abridging the freedom of speech, of expression, or of the press…”
I believe the press is protected only because it is an external mechanism intended to check state abuse. President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo has been trying mightily to revise this particular constitutional provision in order to defang the press and make it into the lapdog that it was during Marcos’ Martial Law.
The Ampatuan massacre has been condemned worldwide. Even in Manila, we feel its chilling effect. As political analyst Manolo Quezon indicated, it has ripped away a talisman that the press thought it had – a thin piece of paper wedged between two pieces of laminated plastic called “the press card”.
If those who killed 30 journalists in one day can get away with it, this signals to others how easy it would be to kill one or two or three.
We were all understandably very eager to know as much as we could how the Ampatuans suddenly became rebels. By the way, this should really qualify the Philippines in the Guinness Book of World Records as the country with the most number of simultaneous rebellions.
We were glad the presidential palace took the trouble to brief us. FOCAP Executive Director Gabby Tabuñar, former Manila correspondent for CBS News, ably steered the question and answer portion. Present in the briefing were the following:
Presidential spokesman and Press Secretary Cerge Remonde
Interior and Local overnments Secretary Ronaldo Puno
Acting Justice Secretary Agnes Devandera
Armed Forces deputy chief of staff for operations Major General Gaudencio S. Pangilinan
Philippine National Police Director General Jesus Versoza
Philippine National Police spokesman Senior Superintendent Leonardo Espina
Philippine National Police Director for Operations Andres Caro II
To listen to Puno answer questions about this posed by Focap member Charmaine Deogracias of NHK, please click on this.
Police Director General Jesus Versoza (second on the right in the video) and Police spokesman Senior Superintendent Leonardo Espina also dazzled us with an enumeration of the wide array of high-powered weapons and thousands of rounds of ammunition they had seized from the Ampatuans’ huge warehouses and palatial homes.
When the government imposed a state of emergency followed by Martial Law in the southern Philippine province of Maguindanao, the reason it gave was that it feared an outbreak of violence between the Ampatuan and Mangudadatu clans.
Authorities had described both clans as “well-armed”. Seeing how well-armed the Ampatuans were, Karl Wilson of Agence France Presse naturally wanted to know if the Mangudadatus had been disarmed as well by the government.
Judge by Puno’s answer whether this has happened.
FOCAP member Dana Batnag of Jiji Press also wanted to know whether the acts of the Ampatuans met the legal definition of rebellion. Dana is a part-time law student at the University of the Philippines College of Law and was once a reporter for The Manila Chronicle.
The Revised Penal Code defines rebellion as “rising publicly and taking arms against the Government for the purpose of removing allegiance from said Government the territory of the Repulic of the Philipines or any part thereof…or depriving the Chief Executive or the Legislature, wholly or partially, of any of their powers or prerogatives.”
Based on our personal experience as reporters, rebellion is being committed by Muslim separatists trying to secede; by communist rebels trying to violently overthrow government; and by soldier rebels trying to unseat the Philippine president.
So what did the Ampatuans try to do to merit such a label, Dana wanted to know. Click on video below to listen to the government’s explanation.
I followed up Dana’s query by asking whether it was possible no rebellion took place because the tax-paid militia men were only ever loyal to the Ampatuans and never to the Philippine Republic. Armed Forces deputy chief of staff for operations Major General Gaudencio S. Pangilinan, seated off camera beside Gabby, gave the answer:
I also asked if authorities had all the while been looking “the other way” while the Ampatuans amassed all those arms and ammo:
FOCAP members were also intrigued to find out who was the leader of the firefights between government forces and Ampatuan loyalists.
Jim Gomez of Associated Press asked the security officials to elaborate on the charges filed against the Ampatuans.
Jim also wanted to know what method the authorities were using to round up the rest of the suspects.
After the briefing, I tried to ransack my mind, trying to compare the Ampatuan rebels with all the other rebels I had encountered. They did not fit any of the current moulds.
Rebels usually secrete documents laying out their ideology and plans. I remember that when the Magdalo group first burst into the picture, the president’s national security adviser Victor Corpuz briefed FOCAP extensively on the Magdalo’s ideology, using computer diskettes they found.
All that ransacking the government did inside the various Ampatuan mansions failed to turn up a single piece of paper outlining the Ampatuan rebel ideology. I sure would like to hear the Ampatuan ideology, or does this consist only of using a chainsaw and a backhoe?
If the Ampatuans had turned rebels on November 26, why did Autonomous Region for Muslim Mindanao Governor Zaldy Ampatuan hold a press conference three days later to appeal to media and the presidential palace to treat him fairly? That would have been the perfect time to launch their rebellion.
Personally, I believe the Arroyo government imposed Martial Law and suspended the writ of habeas corpus so it could arrest the Ampatuans and brand them rebels.
Justice secretary Agnes Devanadera herself stated as much before FOCAP when asked by Manny Mogato of Reuters for an update on the massacre:
Without Martial Law, the Ampatuans are just suspected monsters and mass murderers.
Manny also asked if the government might investigate the Ampatuans if they diverted any funds coming from the USAID (United States Agency for International Development) and Japan’s JICA (Japan International Cooperation Agency) to buying their illegal armory. Here’s Puno’s reply -
Days later, Malacañang Palace backtracked on the matter. See GMAnews story.
What really bothers me is what Arroyo’s deputy spokeswoman Lorelei Fajardo said:
“If we will see later on that the Ampatuans are found guilty based on the investigation, then whether ally or not they will not be given special treatment and they should be punished… but it doesn’t mean that we are no longer friends with them if they are guilty. I think that should be treated separately” (My underscoring.)
It’s okay for the president to continue being friends with the Ampatuans even if they prove to be monsters?
I believe the true test of a democratic nation is the ability of its people to sack their leaders ritually through fraud-free elections. And to criticize and hold them accountable without fear of being buried by a backhoe.
May 10, 2010 | Posted by raissa robles 
Categories: 2010 election, Journalism | 
Tags: FOCAP, Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines, Taguig | 
1 Comment »
