CALLING all journalists, netizens, and bloggers based in Metro Manila:
Are you into investigative reporting?
Would you like to attend a PCIJ seminar?
The last of four seminars on “Political Clans, Governance, and Journalists’ Safety” of the PCIJ will be held on September 19-22, 2013 for the journalists, netizens, and bloggers of Metro Manila.
August 1, 2013, Thursday, is the deadline for application.
Who may apply?
Researchers, anchors, producers, editors, news managers, freelance reporters, contributors, and stringers of print, TV, radio, and online media may apply. Citizen media and bloggers covering public policy issues are also eligible.
The seminar will feature the following sessions:
* Media Killings, Political Violence, and Impunity in the Philippines
* Political Clans: Past and Future Links
* The Government’s Purse: Tracking the State’s Resources
* Ethics and Safety: Field and Newsroom Judgment Calls
* The Fundamentals of Investigative Reporting
* Tracking the Investigative Trails
– The Paper Trail: Understanding, Connecting, and Organizing Documents and Databases
– The People Trail: The Art of the Interview
* Putting the Story Together (for print, broadcast, and multimedia)
Funding
The PCIJ will cover:
- Round-trip transportation from the participant’s place of work and/or residence to the seminar venue.
- Board and lodging during the seminar.
The PCIJ will also provide a modest fellowship grant for story proposals that will be approved during or immediately after the seminar.
Application Requirements
1. Completed application form with two references (download here).
2. One or two samples of work discussing public policy, development, human rights, or governance issues.
For print and online: link to the stories or attach copies of stories in Word or PDF
For TV and radio: script, story concept/treatment, talking points, or research materials used in the broadcast story. A recording of the broadcast may also be submitted. Work samples may be submitted via:
a. Mail — enclose the CD or USB flash disk containing the recording of broadcast
b. Email — attach the material or send the link.
Selection process
Applicants will be selected based on the following criteria:
- Track record or experience in covering public policy issues.
- Demonstrated interest in doing in-depth reports on governance, development, and human rights issues.
- Potential for playing a key leadership role within his/her organization or media community.
Successful applicants will be notified within 10 working days after deadline.
The seminar graduates will be accorded priority slots in the subsequent Advanced Investigative Reporting Seminars that the PCIJ will conduct in 2014.
Sending your application:
By email:
Email address: training@pcij.org
Please state ‘Application to Attend the PCIJ’s Basic IR Seminar’ on the subject line
Note: We will acknowledge receipt of all submissions. If you do not receive any reply within three working days, please resend your application and move a follow-up email or call (02) 410-4768.
By fax:
Telefax: (02) 410-4768
Please write ‘ATTN: PCIJ Training Desk’ on the fax cover sheet
Note: After faxing, please call (02) 410-4768 to confirm if all the documents had been transmitted successfully.
By mail:
The Training Desk
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
3/F Criselda 2 Bldg., 107 Scout de Guia St.
Brgy. Sacred Heart, Quezon City 1104
Note: We will acknowledge receipt of mailed applications via email or text.
Questions?
Please contact the PCIJ Training Desk at (02) 410-4768 or training@pcij.org
Through combined onsite and field learning sessions, the seminar aims to enhance the participants’ investigative reporting skills and practice, and offer a framework for analyzing media killings and safety issues in the context of governance, the culture of impunity, and the presence of political clans and private armed groups in many parts of the country.
The seminar also seeks to highlight the role of the police and human rights organizations as vital sources of information for journalists.
The seminar will feature lecture-discussions and workshops to identify potential risks and practical safety tips when covering dangerous assignments.
A Story Development Workshop will give participants an opportunity to pitch story proposals that the PCIJ may consider for fellowship grants and editorial supervision.
Experts from the academe, national media organizations, the police, human rights agencies and organizations, and data repository agencies will lead the discussions.
CALLING all journalists, bloggers, and netizens in Luzon:
Are you into investigative reporting?
Do you care enough about human rights, political clans, governance, and how we must keep safe and stay alive, so we may all write another day?
This third is a series of PCIJ seminars is for you.
You may apply to attend it until Wednesday next week, July 10, 2013.
Check out this notice from the PCIJ Training Desk:
Application deadline: July 10, 2013
Seminar schedule: Aug. 22-25, 2013
Who may apply?
Mid-career and senior Filipino journalists, netizens, and bloggers. Researchers, anchors, producers, editors, news managers, freelance reporters, contributors, and stringers of print, TV, radio, and online media may apply. Netizens and bloggers writing about public policy issues are eligible.
Seminar Topics
- Media Killings, Political Violence, and Impunity in the Philippines
- Political Clans: Past and Future Links
- The Government’s Purse: Tracking the State’s Resources
- Ethics and Safety: Field and Newsroom Judgment Calls
- The Fundamentals of Investigative Reporting
- Tracking the Investigative Trails
- The Paper Trail: Understanding, Connecting, and Organizing Documents and Databases
- The People Trail: The Art of the Interview
- Putting the Story Together (for print, broadcast, and multimedia)
Funding
The PCIJ will cover:
- Round-trip transportation from the participant’s place of work or residence, to the seminar venue.
- Board and lodging during the seminar.
The PCIJ will also provide a modest fellowship grant for story proposals that will be approved during or immediately after the seminar.
Application Requirements
1. Completed application form with two references. (download here).
2. One or two samples of work discussing public policy, development, human rights, or governance issues.
For print and online: link to the stories or attach copies of stories in Word or PDF.
For TV and radio: script, story concept/treatment, talking points, or research materials used in the broadcast story. A recording of the broadcast may also be submitted.
Work samples may be submitted via:
a. Mail – enclose the CD or USB flash disk containing the recording of broadcast
b. E-mail – attach the material or send the link.
Selection Process
Applicants will be selected based on the following criteria:
- Track record or experience in covering public policy issues.
- Demonstrated interest in doing in-depth reports on governance, development, and human rights issues.
- Potential for playing a key leadership role within his/her organization or media community.
Successful applicants will be notified within 10 working days after deadline.
The seminar graduates will be accorded priority slots in the subsequent Advanced Investigative Reporting Seminars that PCIJ will conduct in 2014.
Sending your application
By email:
Email address: training@pcij.org
Please state ‘Application to Basic IR Seminar’ on the subject line
Note: We will acknowledge receipt of all submissions. If you do not receive any reply within three working days, please resend your application and move a follow-up email or call (02) 410-4768.
By fax:
Telefax: (02) 410-4768
Please write ‘ATTN: PCIJ Training Desk’ on the fax cover sheet
Note: After sending a fax message, please call (02) 410-4768 to confirm if all the documents had been transmitted successfully.
By mail:
The Training Desk
Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism
3/F Criselda 2 Bldg., 107 Scout de Guia St.
Brgy. Sacred Heart, Quezon City 1104
Note: We will acknowledge receipt of mailed applications via email or text.
Questions?
Please contact the PCIJ Training Desk at (02) 410-4768 or training@pcij.org
More PCIJ Regional Seminars
Mindanao (selection process over)
Seminar schedule: July 25- 29, 2013
NCR (Metro Manila)
Application deadline Aug. 1, 2013
Seminar schedule: Sept. 19-22, 2013
What to expect at the seminar
Through combined onsite and field learning sessions, the seminar aims to enhance the participants’s investigative reporting skills and practice, and offer a framework for analyzing media killings and safety issues in the context of governance, the culture of impunity, and the presence of political clans and private armed groups in many parts of the country. The seminar also seeks to highlight the role of the police and human rights organizations as vital sources of information for journalists.
The seminar will feature lecture-discussions and workshops to identify potential risks and practical safety tips when covering dangerous assignments. A Story Development Workshop will give participants an opportunity to pitch story proposals that the PCIJ may consider for fellowship grants and editorial supervision.
Experts from the academe, national media organizations, the police, human rights agencies and organizations, and data repository agencies will lead the discussions.
THE PHILIPPINE CENTER FOR INVESTIGATIVE JOURNALISM’S Malou Mangahas has been chosen as the Marshall Mcluhan Fellow for 2013 for her outstanding work in the field of journalism.
The award was announced Thursday by the Canadian Embassy after a panel discussion by veteran journalists on the topic Reporting the 2013 Campaign and Elections during the Jaime V. Ongpin Journalism Seminar organized by the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.
Mangahas was chosen from among the panelists by a committee of distinguished senior journalists. The award was named after the famed Canadian communications theorist Marshall Mcluhan. The Embassy of Canada and Sunlife Financial are the main sponsors of the annual Mcluhan Fellowship.
As this year’s Mcluhan fellow, Mangahas is entitled to a ten-day familiarization and lecture tour of Canadian media and academic institutions. She will also be conducting a lecture tour of selected Philippine universities under the auspices of the Canadian embassy.
Mangahas started out by pounding the beat for national broadsheets during the Marcos regime, before being appointed as editor-in-chief of the Manila Times. Later, she would become the senior correspondent of Reuters news agency in Manila, and the first editor in chief of www.gmanews.tv.
Mangahas also served as Vice President for Research and Content Development for GMA-7 News and Public Affairs, before assuming the role of Executive Director of the PCIJ. She is also a member of the Board of Trustees of the Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA) and the Freedom Fund for Filipino Journalists (FFFJ).
Mangahas was a Nieman Fellow at Harvard University in 1998-1999.
The following is a live blog of the 17th National Press Forum of the Philippine Press Forum at the New World Hotel entitled Watching the Watchdog: Re-examining Ourselves.
DAY 2
June 14, 20013
The second day of the annual PPI conference begins with a discussion on how Philippine newspapers are surviving in the digital age. At a time when US newspapers have been closing down with alarming regularity and media workers in the western world are being laid off, it would be good to look at the Philippine experience, and see if there are points of similarity or divergence.
Cebu Daily News publisher Eileen Mangubat, who introduced the first session, spoke of the problem faced by today’s newspapers – rising costs for paper, electricity, and wages, while advertising revenues and circulation remain flat or have started sliding down.
Mangubat said nowhere is this felt more than in the provinces, where radio and television, which reach more people, are getting the lion’s share of the revenues.
“Here lies the paradox: people are consuming more information today than ever before, and are impatient for news,” Mangubat said. “They may not be reading daily or weekly newspapers, but they are finding out more at faster speeds through the internet.”
But rather than seeing this as a death knell for newspapers, Mangubat said media agencies should see this as an opportunity to improve skills and adopt new technologies.
“The demand for news and information and good design and visuals are the biggest opportunity for the news media to do what it does best – story telling with a purpose,” Mangubat said. “In the end, the mission of journalism remains the same: to inform the people and tell the truth.”
Mangubat however stressed the need for media organizations to forge a “deliberate strategy” to make use of these challenges and opportunities. This, because good journalism will always cost money, and it would be up to good journalists and media agencies to find the right formula for doing good journalism – and staying afloat.
The first speaker was Mel Velarde, chief executive officer of Information Capital Technology Ventures, Inc, on diversifying news content and online competitiveness.
Velarde began by emphasizing the importance of trust and diversification in the online world.
“Trust is the monetization engine online,” Velarde said. This, because the online world is, more and more, dependent on the value of trust.
As for diversification, Velarde said media agencies who choose to diversify their content and distribution should keep in mind the four ways by which consumers consume content:
Focused consumption;
Time shifting;
Dual mode;
Infosnackss, or information sachets.
Velarde also stressed the need for caution in taking in new technologies; some agencies adopt too many platforms for all protocols, thereby losing money in the process.
What is needed, Velarde said, is what he calls “responsive web design,” wherein content is automatically repurposed for all media online platforms, or what he calls a “buy-one-take-four” design.
Rappler editor-at-large Marites Vitug, speaking on the transition from print to online, spoke of the challenges of moving from mainstream to the web.
Vitug related the experience of publishing Newsbreak, an investigative news magazine that at first was published in print, before being forced to move online because of rising publication costs. However, even online, Vitug said Newsbreak had difficulty staying out of the red, since most of the online advertisements still kept going to the bigger established and mainstream news websites.
In order to address these financial issues, Newsbreak entered into a partnership with a giant mainstream media organization in order to stay afloat. While the arrangement proved to be relatively comfortable in terms of finances, many in Newsbreak had difficulty adjusting to both the television and online 24-hour news beast.
In the end, Vitug said that while news on the web still seems to be largely event driven, in that hits go up with big events like disasters, calamities, and elections, online journalists should not be driven by this alone.
“We have to be careful not to be solely influenced by the numbers in our choices of news,” she said. “We should still have the lesser read stuff like science and politics.”
“News is not like American Idol. Our duty is to bear witness,” she said.
“The challenge to the print medium is this: Today, the papers have a tougher job to do, they need to go a step further beyond the breaking news to the in-depth,” Vitug said. This, because the internet “already tells us the news minute by minute, hour by hour.”
“Newspapers should do the service by explaining what this all means to the public,” she said.
Also invited to the panel in order to give the community press some tips on how to engage advertisers and make their newspapers more attractive as an advertising platform, the PPI also invited representatives from Proctor and Gamble and Mead Johnson.
Clint Navales, head of Communications for Proctor and Gamble and corporate secretary of the Philippine Association of National Advertisers (PANA), said the consumers were “hungry for intimacy,” something that community newspapers could tap into.
Navales pointed out that community newspapers would presumably be more in touch with the culture, social networks, and habits of their own communities. If the community papers could tap into this knowledge, then they would be more attractive to advertisers than the mainstream national media.
“The consumers want the brands to talk to them as individuals,” Navales said.
“The community papers can create a look and feel that is premium and costumized to the unique culture of a community,” he said. “Iba dapat ang Panay News sa Davao, iba ang Visayan Daily Star sa Baguio Midland Courier.”
Wally Panganiban, corporate affairs head of Mead Johnson Nutrition, stressed the need for journalists and media agencies to “develop new readers.”
“Do not rely on how they access the media on their own, because chances are they will miss out,” Panganiban said.
In addition, Panganiban said media agencies should also make an effort to “grow talents in the newsroom,” and not just harvest good journalists from outside.
“We have to inspire future professional journalists, we have to find a way to excite people to take up journalism as a career, as a profession,” he said.
Panganiban also stressed the need for what he called media development. For example, Panganiban pointed out that while the PPI has the annual conference every year to talk about issues in the industry, the major newspapers almost never cover these events.
“So these issues do not get communicated outside, they do not go out into the mainstream discussion, and that is sad,” he said.
In the open forum, some PPI members pointed out that while an online presence may be necessary for Manila media, advertisers should not shut out provincial media agencies which do not have an online presence.
Adrian Amatong, a publisher from Mindanao, pointed out that many of their readers don’t have online access to begin with; in fact, Amatong said, many of their readers are not even internet literate. Amatong said it would not be fair for advertisers to expect provincial papers to show technological innovations online when they do not need it on the ground to begin with.
Carla Gomez of the Visayan Daily Star for her part threw back the challenge to advertisers. “You guys need to explore our markets in the provinces,” she said. “We have more hits than the actual sales of newspapers, and we are much cheaper.”
Gomez said advertisers should stop being so engrossed with the national news media, and start looking at the potentials in the countryside.
Gomez says her media agency services a large community of people abroad, as well as a niche market. “There is a large Negros community who do not read the national newspapers,” she said.
“We are the future for advertising as well,” Gomez said, drawing applause from PPI members.
Panganiban of Mead Johnson asked the controversial question that got everybody’s attention.
After several community newspapers made a pitch to the advertising community to place ads in the community press, Panganiban said: “The question is, does everybody need to survive?”
To this, several PPI members were heard saying “Yes, of course!”
However, Panganiban pointed out that the question needed to be asked because not all newspapers hew closely to the standards that even the PPI holds dear. Panganiban also indicated that for good newspapers to survive in the digital age, newspapers that don’t deserve to survive also have to fold up.
“Are all newspapers complying with the standards for paying their reporters?” Panganiban asked. “Are all these papers holding to the good and the true?”
“Surviving means getting rid of those who don’t deserve to survive,” he added.
10:45 a.m.
Session 2
For the second session of the last day of the PPI annual conference, Atty. Nepomuceno Malaluan of the Right to Know Right Now Coalition gave an update on the long-stalled Freedom of Information bill.
Malaluan said the FOI bill will again have to start from scratch when the 16th Congress begins with the President’s State of the Nation Address.
“We felt the FOI bill was more than ripe already after all those years,” Malaluan said. Malaluan said that FOI advocates are making adjustments with the lessons from the failure of the FOI to pass through the 15th Congress.
For instance, Malaluan said they relied mainly on a core of FOI champions in the lower chamber to push the bill through “on the belief that this could be done with the backing from the President.”
However, since Malacanang appeared cool to the FOI, the measure languished in the lower chamber, barely squeezing through the House committee on public information, and wallowing in the plenary. On the other hand, the FOI bill in the Senate had already been passed on third reading.
Malaluan said FOI advocates plan to “hit the ground running” with a press conference on the 24th of June, 2013.
Malaluan said the version that the coalition will push with the 16th Congress is an “embodiment of the consensus” of various advocacy groups that have consistently pushed the FOI.
The major points of the latest version of the FOI bill include:
A clear definition of Freedom of Information that also clearly lists the exceptions to the FOI
The removal of a wide discretion on the part of government to deny FOI
Speedy procedure for the access of documents
Enumeration of specific acts that are violative of the right to information, constituting administrative or criminal offenses.
Standards for record keeping and disclosure by the government
And finally, an affirmation that any move to include a Right of Reply proviso would be rejected outright, and would in fact be the line that divides true FOI champions and those who only pretend to push the measure.
“We have seen in the past five Congresses that the full application of our right to information is strongly resisted by bureaucrats. We will never get the FOI easily. It is clear that determined political action is necessary, and we are hoping to work with you as soon as the 16th Congress opens,” Malaluan said.
Asked to comment on the approval by the Supreme Court of a petition by the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) for the release of the statements of assets, liabilities, and net worth of the Supreme Court Justices, Malaluan said the decision by the tribunal was a victory for FOI advocates. However, Malaluan stressed that there were more battles ahead, especially on the issue of getting the SC to revise its rules and guidelines for the release of the SALNs.
Malou Mangahas, Executive Director of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, pointed out that the PCIJ petition was with the court for a total of ten months before the petition was acted upon.
Mangahas added that the tribunal had imposed too many conditions for the court to even consider the petition, including notarized affidavits and articles of incorporation, as well as lengthy justifications for the request and what interest the request was supposed to serve.
This, even though Republic Act 6713, the Code of Conduct and Ethical Standards for Public OFficials and Employees, merely states that SALNs should be made accessible to anyone within 15 working days after these are filed.
Mangahas also spoke on how the media covered the 2013 midterm elections, and the importance of learning from the recent poll experience in order to apply these lessons for 2016.
Managahas said the coverage of the midterm elections was a mixed bag of sorts, with some media agencies going beyond the spot breaking reports and the usual general profiles of candidates, while others were content to report uncritically what the campaign spins of the candidates.
For example, she said it was clear that many media organizations gave inordinate focus on “better known and more moneyed candidates” of the administration and the opposition. On the other hand, many media agencies merely gave “negligible and token coverage of independent candidates.”
Mangahas said reporters and editors would do well to remember that political coverage does not end with the May 2013 elections, and that media should now shift to collecting on the promises that candidates made should, and prepare to cover the May 2016 elections better.
“More than sending candidates to power, it is about holding them to account for abusing that power,” she said. “It is wrong to think that the coverage ends on May 13, 2013, when in fact, we should expand, continue, and sustain it even today, in preparation for 2016.”
“More than the usual coverage of elections, we should be happy that somehow we have done more than the usual coverage,” Mangahas said. “But is doing better than usual good enough for our audience?”
“I think the focus should be how can we cover the elections better in 2016. After all, everyone says the 2013 elections is just the front act for 2016,”she said
Mangahas also revealed some details of a PCIJ study on the living and working conditions of journalists, especially in the Visayas, and how economic circumstances may be one element that could affect how a journalist behaves. Mangahas said the study would be released later this month.
At the same time, Managahas sought to place corruption in media in the proper context, saying corruption is a complex issue that should not be painted in broad strokes of black and white. Minor and grave omissions or violations of the journalism’s code of ethics may all be what some people mean when they talk about “corruption” in the media, she said.
Likewise, the issue of “corruption” is better addressed by media organizations, not by finger-pointing or by declaring one to be holier than the rest, but by a combined and concerted effort at self-regulation. At the same time, she said the media should even more vigorously rail against “the supply side” of corruption, notably sources “who seem to think that everyone in media has a price.”
Journalism codes of ethics, she spelled out, cluster possible violations between “black and white” issues such as accepting cash or gifts or favors, in exchange for favorable stories, but also the “grey domain” of conflict of interest situations, deceptive methods of getting stories, and even sloppy reporting or failure to get all sides to a story, she said.
“The challenge is to live it (ethics) out every day in the field and in the newsroom, to take the issues as they come, to disclose conflicts of interests, to decide with the welfare of the audience as primary concern,” Mangahas said. “Mas maganda aralin kung ano ang gagawin step by step, as individuals, as newsrooms, and as a community.”
She said any discussions of supposed “corruption” in the media should not be seen as occasion for the government to crack down on the citizen’s freedom of speech, of the press, and to assemble peaceably that are inalienable rights of all the citizens under the Constitution.
AT ITS 17TH National Conference that opens today at the New World Hotel in Makati City, the Philippine Press Institute (PPI), the national association of newspapers of the Philippines, tackles a delicate yet necessary theme: a self re-exmination of the responsibilities of the Philippine press.
The conference, titled Watching the Watchdog: Re-examining Ourselves, calls attention to the need for the Philippine press to exercise its watchdog role, not just on the three pillars of government, but on the fourth estate as well.
Indeed, the conference opens with a talk by University of the Philippines College of Mass Communications Dean Roland Tolentino on the issue of competence and professional values in the media. Tolentino will discuss the sensitive question: Is the quality of professional practice by the Philippine media poor?
Other topics that are certain to generate much discussion and possibly even debate during the conference are economic rights and working conditions of journalists, and how traditional newspapers are surviving the digital age.
The PPI is the national association of newspapers whose primary mandate is the defense of press freedom and the promotion of ethical standards in the journalism community. The Institute was founded in 1964, but was only revived in 1986 with the ouster of former President Ferdinand Marcos.
The Institute holds a National Press Forum and general membership meeting every year in order to gather senior members of the journalism community for a dialogue on the pressing needs and concerns of the industry. The PPI also works closely with media organizations such as the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism on a wide spectrum of issues such as media concerns, governance, press freedom, and freedom of information.
Aside from Dean Tolentino, the other resource persons who had been invited to address the PPI forum are: Rowena Paraan, national president of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP); Malou Mangahas, executive director of the Philippine Center on Investigative Journalism (PCIJ); and Marites Vitug of social news network Rappler; journalist-blogger Raissa Robles; and Ramon Tuazon of the Asian Institute of Journalism and Communication (AIJC).
What follows is a live blog of the two-day 17th PPI National Press Forum at the New World Hotel in Makati City.
DAY 1
June 13, 2013
1:30
The PPI national conference began with the cutting of the ribbon for the 17th Annual Press Forum at the entrance of the grand ballroom of the New World Hotel in Makati.
Gracing the occasion were PPI President and Chairman Amado Macasaet, PPI vice chairman Vergel Santos, and Adel Tamano, director for public affairs of Coca Cola Philippines, which assisted in the conference.
This was followed by the viewing by the PPI members and guests of exhibits from newspapers all over the country of their stories and editions based on the theme Climate Change and Biodiversity.
PPI President and chairman Amado ‘Jake’ Macasaet opened the annual conference with a reminder to the assembled journalists that journalists are not a special class of people who must be given special privileges – or preferences.
Macasaet said it was necessary for media to conduct a self examination of he industry because of the need to address the issue of corruption in the media.
“We will try to address this not by stabbing ourselves in the back, but right here, where we can get hurt. There should not be personal feelings about how we have failed in doing our jobs,” Macasaet said.
“We cannot lay claim to honesty and integrity if you have a thief in your own home,” Macasaet said.
As well, Macasaet said it was about time that mediamen realize that they should not hold themselves above the rest of society, with special privileges that are not granted to ordinary Filipinos.
“In my thinking, a newspaperman should not look at selves as one who is different from the man next door,” Macasaet said. For example, Macasaet pointed out how mediamen raise hell whenever one of their own is killed. However, “do we care about a balut vendor, for example, whose daily earnings are fleeced by a cop?”
“We really don’t,” he said.
“We should veer away from the idea that we are a special class of people,” Macasaet said.
At the same time Macasaet decried how, despite repeated conferences and meetings, the PPI has not been able to keep its member-publishers in line in terms of ethics and professionalism.
“We cannot get the publishers to be bound,” Macasaet said. “For example, the press councils; we have investigations of complaints, and guilt is found, and recommendations are sent to the publishers – and then nothing happens!”
In his opening remarks, PPI vice chairman Vergel Santos traced the roots of some of the causes of today’s issues in journalism and media, beginning with the declaration of Martial Law which derailed the development of the media industry, and globalization and the rush of new technologies, which he said turned everything into a matter of markets and economies.
Santos also bewailed how journalism in the traditional sense has been “hijacked” by new communications technology that has overtaken many practitioners.
“Now, the field belongs more to non journalists, the professionals in whose suitably trained hands it was supposed to rest,” Santos said.
“this technology culprit now allows anyone to string words together, and to foist on the rest of the world misinformation and confusion instead of enlightenment,” Santos said.
For his part UP College of Mass Communications Dean Roland Tolentino, in his talk on the quality of the professional skills of mediamen today, pointed to the new modality in journalism wherein journalism has to contend with popular appeal. This is more apparent in broadcast, where, for example, Tolentino says national news is “showbizified,” and showbiz is “nationalized.”
In the first, Tolentino says, the trivial aspects of national personalities are highlighted; for example, stories on the lovelife of the President, or red carpet reports on important state events, or stories on the hobbies of political personalities. The second, on the other hand, pushes trivial matters such as showbiz on the national scene, giving them equal prominence as more urgent issues.
“This underscores the system of equivalences, the dumbing down of news and the condescending take on audiences,” Tolentino said. “Newspapers need to tell the truth, but they also need to sell the truth.”
‘The negotiation is based on the truth on one hand, and the selling of the truth on the other hand,” Tolentino said.
Tolentino added that while there appears to be more than enough students graduating from journalism schools today, a sizeable number of media workers do not come from these programs. As such, “the competencies are to be learned and mastered on the job. This makes for an uneven landscape of competencies.”
“The result is a need for more training of core values, and a perennial catch-up game to meet professional standards,” Tolentino said.
PPI vice chairman Vergel Santos
UP MassComm Dean Roland Tolentino
Several issues came up during the open forum for the first panel, including the lack of a venue for working journalists to upgrade their skills while at the same time working. The audience asked if universities are already offering short certification courses on, for example, how to understand a financial statement.
Dean Tolentino said that these courses are being studied now by many universities. Santos for his part cited the importance of continuing studies and training, if only to ensure that journalists who report the news must first know how to understand the news they report. For example, Santos said that the ability of a journalist to read a financial statement would ensure that he knows how the data in a financial statement could be fudged by government officials who want to look good.
Another member of the audience cited the need for journalists and their media agencies to reveal their “environment,” or “where they are coming from,” so that their audience or readers are better able to understand them.
Santos however took it a step further by stressing the need for newspapers and media organizations to reveal their funders and business interests to the public so as to erase any doubts. Santos said this is akin to requiring government officials to submit and disclose their statements of assets, liabilities, and net worth or SALNs.
June 13, 2013
2:55 p.m.
For the second panel, Asian Institute of Journalism president Ramon Tuazon spoke of media’s re-examination of the role of news in a democracy. Tuazon centered on two issues here: marketability as a news value, and corruption in media.
Tuazon said that marketability has established itself in the news media as one of the primary elements of a story. Marketability is called several names, or defined in several ways, the most popular being the ratings system.
As for corruption in media, Tuazon said a series of roundtable discussions among media men in the provinces reveal that corruption is very prevalent in media, permeating all levels from the lowest to the highest.
Tuazon said the it has gotten to the point that it already has its own vocabulary: bukol, didal, ATM journalism, etc. Corruption has also evolved into other forms, giving the appearance of regularity.
For example, some media agencies make their journalists do double roles as account executives. Other media agencies foist the argument that there is no corruption if there is no under the table deal, and that a contract can legitimize the changing of hands of money.
Other arguments and statements that came up during the roundtable discussions:
There is no corruption pag hindi mo hiningi ang ibinigay sa iyo
Pag walang corruptuon, maraming journalists na maghihirap
“That everyone does it is now an excuse to justify corruption,” Tuazon said.
Rowena Paraan, head of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP), for her part pointed to violations of the economic rights of journalists as another kind of violence against media.
For example, Paraan said many journalists especially in the countryside “have no idea of the minimum wage, or that minimum wage should apply to them.”
Paraan also decried the practice of many media agencies in the provinces of requiring reporters to sell ad space or airtime to the people they cover, in exchange for a ten or 20 percent commission.
In fact, Paraan said, she has heard that some media agencies actually find it more convenient and profitable to have their more prominent reporters personally sell ad space or airtime to their sources. “Let’s face it, this is a conflict of interest situation,” Paraan said.
Paraan also pointed to yet another practice by media agencies of refusing to recognize an employer-employee relationship with their reporters in order to avoid giving them labor benefits. This contractualization of journalists makes them more vulnerable to safety and ethical issues, Paraan said.
In fact, Paraan said some media agencies, including the major networks, have already shown expertise in finding loopholes in labor laws. Some networks, for example, invented all sorts of levels in order to ensure that there are few employees who can become members of unions.
Paraan said it was unfortunate that many media agencies have taken this route, so that “the future of the profession that is the backbone of democracy is now in danger.”
Raissa Robles, Manila correspondent of the South China Morning Post and a popular blogger, in turn spoke on how new technology was reshaping the way journalists bring the news to the public.
Robles, who says she was once also digitally challenged, now challenged editors and publishers to adapt to a rapidly changing world instead of staying as part of the “digitally homeless.”
“The once a day cycle is gone, and the newspapers don’t seem to care,” she said. “But the people want it now, not tomorrow.”
Robles said the what was a one-way street before is now an interactive world. “Before, the press told readers what stand to take through their editorials, and controlled feedback through the letters to the editors,” she said. Now, however, Robles said, newspapers need to move from “entitlement to people empowerment.”
Robles added that journalists should not fear becoming obsolete. Mainstream journalists would survive, Robles said, provided they maintain and develop four skills:
The ability to recognize something as newsy;
The ability to get facts completely and accurately;
The ability to get the other side or the contrary view;
and the ability to sense a pattern of events and make sense of it
Eileen Mangubat, editor of the Cebu Daily News, remarked that it would also be good for the panelists to speak about the positive efforts by many journalists to fight corruption in the media. Mangubat said that while publishers and editors recognize the problem of corruption, there is value in also applauding the efforts of journalists to clean their ranks.
The discussion on corruption in media proved quite controversial, as some publishers took the floor to explain why some media agencies adopt practices that media organizations describe as unethical.
One publisher said it was difficult for his newspaper to take the cudgels for his local officials if it tries to be critical. The local officials in his province, for example, have proven to be quite supportive of his newspaper to begin with.
This remark drew many comments from the panel and the floor, with several panelists saying they were disturbed by the remark of the publisher. Tuazon pointed out that it is not the job of a journalist “to take the cudgels for his local officials” to begin with.
Another publisher was more cautious, saying it was not fair to talk about corruption by journalists, when the issue is really “corruption of the publisher.”
“There is a difference between publishers and mediamen,” he said. “We survive by the patronage of the politicians and the businessmen, they are the source of our income. This supports my theory that in the rural areas, you should not call it corruption of the media or of the journalists, it could be corruption of the publisher.”
Tuazon for his part proposed a system of accreditation and classification of media personnel by a reputable group or network of groups, so long as government is in no way involved in the system. This, Tuazon said, would help address the issue of professionalizing the media industry.
Eileen Mangubat of the Cebu Daily News pointed out the need for everyone to disclose just how much they are paying their journalists. Mangubat said if need be, an independent organization should come out with a study or a white paper, since “it will never come out of the owners.”
“It’s important to see the baeline, so that we see what is fair and exploitative,” Mangubat said.
Paraan said owners and publishers should also not use their economic woes to justify their refusal to pay their employees decent wages, or to give their employees benefits, or even to simply recognize or acknowledge their journalists as actual bona fide employees.