Volume 1, Issue No. 43
OPINION/COMMENTARY
/ News That Fears None, Views That Favor Nobody /
. . . . . A community service of The Filipino Web Channel (TheFilipinoWebChannel@gmail. com) and the Philippine Village Voice (PhilVoiceNews@gmail.com) for the information and understanding of Filipinos and the diverse communities in North America . . .
Our latest as of Thursday, May 14, 2020
~ The eleven million (11,000,000) workers Rappler's Maria Ressa had earlier claimed lost their jobs by the shutdown of ABS-CBN was an egregious lie that fits the broadcast station's narrative as "the Philippines' largest network". But neither that number nor the eleven thousand (11,000) she said was the right figure was correct. The more accurate count was four thousand (4,000), according to Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III, based on what the radio-TV empire had supplied to the government agency. But even then, these workers continue to be employed as the shutdown did not mean dissolving the corporation. The 11-million translates to 11-million lies and 11-million loss of face.
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AN EGREGIOUS LIE AND A LOSS OF FACE
Over-Inflating ABS-CBN's Emotional Appeal
By ROMEO P. MARQUEZ
Editor, The Filipino Web Channel
“It's not a person's mistakes which define them - it's the way they make amends.” ―
TORONTO - "Before opening your mouth," a good friend said in an email alerting me to the story, "make sure you know the facts: it's not 11 million, but more than 4,000". And to add to her obvious disappointment, she stressed in Tagalog: "Akala ko ba matalino siya".
That encapsulates the disbelief many of us feel once we got wind of this interview Maria Ressa had with ABC News Australia on Thursday, May 7, 2020, where she stated that eleven million (11,000,000) workers have lost their jobs after ABS-CBN shut down two days earlier on May 5, 2020. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8ZbdunLl4KM).
That magnitude would approximate the population of either the Dominican Republic (85th ranked), which has 10,847,910 people and South Sudan (84th ranked), which has 11,193,725 people. But ABS-CBN is just a broadcast network, not a country. Nonetheless, the media refer to it, metaphorically, as an empire.
Ressa's number is, of course, over-inflated. The popular figure circulating in social media is eleven thousand (11,000), which, apparently, is also false, but not denied by ABS-CBN officials.
Philippine Labor Secretary Silvestre Bello III, however, puts the official count in a television interview at four thousand (4,000) workers affected by the closure.
Contrary to what's being fanned out, Bello stressed that the cease and desist order served on ABS-CBN did not result in the displacement of the 4,000 workers who remain employees of the network. "The order did not dissolve the corporation which continues to operate on social media," he explained. (Video at the 2:32 mark https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Il2n-C5CLPs).
Late into the night a day later, on May 8, 2020, Ressa, co-founder, CEO, and editor of the online news website Rappler, apologized to ABC News Australia and its anchor, Beverly O'Connor, explaining that her mind was racing ahead to what she was going to say next.
"I made a mistake. ABS-CBN has 11,000 workers," Ressa stated in what sounded like an impersonal remark on Facebook.
"That error," she admitted, "has been used by nice Filipinos to call me ugly, to attack Rappler, and to incite hate against journalists. The error was all mine".
Contrite? No. Unregretful and belligerent? Yes. She then took a swipe at them: "Sad that these folks have nothing better to do while our freedoms are being eroded".
That last sentence subtly hints at her as a freedom fighter of sorts. Whatever she makes of herself, the truth contravenes her facts. Her apology posted on Facebook was superficial. She also made an excuse of being "tired" when she did the interview. (Full text: https://www.facebook.com/mariaressa/posts/10220761078004125).
Indeed on the next day after she has presumably rested, she forgot to say sorry to the hundreds of Filipinos who watched the interview and felt insulted, and to the millions more who support the government of President Rodrigo Duterte in and outside of the Philippines.
The "mistake" she owned up later planted the image of a heartless administration that did not bother whether or not harried workers survive the coronavirus pandemic with its decision to shut down ABS-CBN network and dislodge them from earning a living.
To me as a journalist, Ressa's statement was a reckless attempt - the latest so far in a string of attacks - to paint a grim picture of the homeland and the alleged repression taking place nationwide. The fact that Rappler could operate and Ressa could speak out are the best examples to repudiate those allegations.
Manila Times columnist Rigoberto Tiglao, author, former press secretary and ambassador, calls Ressa, in his own words, "a colossal con man or con woman or con person". Rappler, according to him, "has been the Yellow regime’s apologist, financed in so many ways by government contracts and a Yellow oligarch’s covert financial support".
In local parlance, the Yellows (an allusion to the Aquino-Cojuangco clan of former presidents Corazon Aquino and her son Benigno "Noynoy" Aquino of "Tie a Yellow Ribbon" fame) are the anti-Duterte individuals, organizations, and politicians who suffered a catastrophic loss in the 2016 presidential election. The group is now headed by Vice President Leni Robredo, a Liberal.
Through Rappler, Ressa has been a vocal arch-critic of Mr. Duterte. His administration has filed several cases against her, including four counts of tax violations. (List of cases at: https://www.rappler.com/nation/223968-list-cases-filed-against-maria-ressa-rappler-reporters).
A Manila lawyer, Trixie Cruz-Angeles, said in her radio program that Ressa's mistake was probably an honest one. She'd give her the benefit of the doubt even as she said it's difficult for her to apply the word "honest" on Ressa. (Video at the 6:39 mark: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RexihfFtXo).
Ressa had been a media colleague in the heydays of President Cory Aquino. We bumped into each other occasionally at press coverages, she as bureau chief of CNN in Manila, and I, as a correspondent for the German News Agency (Deutsche Presse-Agentur). (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ik0AXXyPXaE).
The last time I saw her again was three decades later, in London, UK actually, where we happened to cover the Global Summit to End Sexual Violence in Conflict in June 2014. (Video at: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uTK4sxg42r0).
On a professional level, I find her affable but deeply competitive. But that's how it is in the foreign press, particularly in wire agencies where seconds in presenting the late-breaking news matter. (Copyright 2020. All Rights Reserved).
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