Under the Maggie de Pano Fund for Investigative Reporting for Health, journalists may avail of funding for reports on health. The reports may be on issues such as the misuse of public health funds, policies that affect public health, and any abuse, mismanagement or neglect by any health-oriented individuals and institutions, public and private.

Newsbreak said it will be granting the six fellowships in three cycles. The three cycles will be awarded within one year. Two fellowships will be granted for each cycle.

Deadline for entries for the first cycle is on Sept. 20, Monday, while fellowships will start on Oct. 4. Fellows will get P1,000 daily allowance for 40 days, shouldering of expenses (food, accommodation, and two-way travel for those coming from the provinces) during Newsbreak’s five-day mentoring in the early part of the fellowship, and reimbursement of expenses for out-of-town fieldwork.

Interested applicants must submit the following: an application letter; two sample investigative reports on health; one or more proposals for an investigative health story, with research plan and timetable; and a letter from the applicant’s publisher or editor granting him/her reduced workload for the fellowship’s duration. A freelancer must secure a guarantee from any legitimate media organization that it will publish his/her work.

Requirements may be sent through email. Other inquiries may be sent to the said email, or on Newsbreak’sFacebook page. 
The Public Trust Media Group owns Newsbreak. It is funded by international and local individuals and organizations.

The fellowship, according to an official news release, seeks to maximize traditional and new media to get more Filipinos aware of how population is intertwined with poverty and development issues.

Although media practitioners across all fields and bloggers 18 years old and above are encouraged to attend the introductory forum last Saturday, non-attendees may still apply.

Selected proposals will be awarded fellowships of up to P25,000. Entries may either be in traditional (print, broadcast) or new media (blog, podcast) format.

Applicants may submit fellowship proposals whether or not they will attend the forum. Application and proposal forms can be downloaded here. The forms, together with a link or email copy of sample works (article, script or video output), may be submitted until September 6, Monday.

Questions regarding the forum and the fellowship may be sent here.

The PMFI-conducted program is supported by the Philippine Center for Population and Development (PPCD). PPCD supports programs on human development and population control.

The Asia Pacific Journalism Center (APJC) invites journalists in the region to apply for its two-week fellowship program. The fellowship, themed “Challenges to stability and development in Indonesia, Malaysia and Singapore”, will be held from Nov. 8 to 26.

The Australia-based APJC is a nonprofit organization that conducts programs for journalists in developing countries. It organized the fellowship program with funding from the Melbourne-based Myer Foundation and Dame Elizabeth Murdoch, mother of multimedia mogul Rupert Murdoch.

According to an APJC news release, the program seeks to improve the participants’ knowledge of the cultural, environment, socio-political and economic issues in Asia-Pacific countries, and how these affect the region’s development.

Fellows will attend a dialogue and orientation program at the Sidney Myer Asia Center and the Asia Pacific Journalism Centre in Melbourne, Australia before embarking on a two-week study tour that will cover the region. Destinations include Melbourne, Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Jakarta.

Interested applicants must have at least eight years of journalistic experience and must be fluent in English. Application forms are available here. Applicants must send the following with the application form before Sept. 15:

1. A 500-word essay stating: the applicant’s expectations; the topic the applicant wishes to cover, and a brief description of the applicant’s news organization;
2. A letter of recommendation from the supervisor; and
3. A statement of support from the employer.

Applications, as well as questions, may be sent through email.

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The Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) held the Jaime V. Ongpin Journalism Seminar (JVOJS) which discussed press issues and problems in the coverage of the 2010 elections. The seminar was held at the AIM Conference Center in Makati today (June 24).

CMFR Executive Director Melinda Quintos de Jesus also announced the formation of the Jaime V. Ongpin Journalism Seminar Fellows as a group that will increase from year to year and will be convened periodically in press forums on political and development issues.

The Fellows, who were panelists at this year’s seminar, were:

The University of the Philippines College of Mass Communication (UP CMC) and South Korea’s Inha University are organizing the conference themed “Asian Media Cooperation and Cultural Exchange” from October 7 to 8.

The news release said the conference aims to “bring together scholars from the Philippines, Korea and other countries” to share and discuss media and cultural issues across Asia.

According to UP CMC College Secretary Danilo Arao, the college has organized several international conferences in the past. Some of the more recent ones include the Association of Southeast Asian Nation’s (ASEAN) Inter-University Conference in 2008 and the Sangandaan International Conference on Arts and Media on Philippine-American Relations, co-sponsored by the Cultural Center of the Philippines and San Francisco State University in 2003.

Interested participants may register by submitting the following: full name, institutional (school, office, organization) affiliation, email address and telephone number here.

Participants may send their abstracts until Sunday, Aug. 22. Full papers shall be submitted by Sept. 7. Abstracts and full papers must be sent to the mentioned email address. The UP CMC will shoulder the transportation expenses of delegates from outside the Philippines. More information can be accessed here.

Organized by the International Committee of the Red Cross or ICRC in partnership with the Philippine National Red Cross, the award, said the news release, will recognize “stories that best illustrate the humanitarian consequence of armed conflicts.” The call for entries started on August 12, coinciding with the international humanitarian law day.

The Switzerland-based ICRC is an independent organization that protects civilians, prisoners of war, refugees and other people caught in armed conflicts, pursuant to the Geneva Conventions of 1949. The 1949 Conventions, signed by 149 countries including the Philippines, included the provision to protect civilian and non-fighting entities (e.g. wounded and sick armed men) from the atrocities of war within and among countries.

In the Philippines, the ICRC has a delegation of 149 staff members, holding offices in Manila, Davao, Cotabato, Zamboanga and Tacloban. The ICRC has been supporting the PNRC in local humanitarian work.

Professional and freelance journalists working for any print, online, radio or television outfits may send published or aired material: news reports, feature articles or documentaries. Entries must highlight the consequences of armed conflict. Interested participants around the country may send their entries in any of the following schools:

Northern and Central Luzon: Central Luzon State University, Muñoz, Nueva Ecija
Metro Manila and Southern Luzon: St. Scholastica’s College Manila
Visayas: Cebu Technological University, Cebu City
Mindanao: Xavier University, Cagayan de Oro City

Entries must be published or aired between Aug. 12, 2010 and March 12, 2011. Each entry must have three copies authenticated by the organization where it appeared.

The International Safety Institute (INSI), Peace and Conflict Journalism Network (Pecojon) Phillippines, Philippine Association of Communication Educators (PACE) and Rotary Club of Manila (RCM) are supporting the project. Representatives from the partner organizations: INSI Consultant for Asia Pacific Red Batario, Pecojon Philippines Project Head Charlie Saceda, PACE President Flordeliz Abanto and former Press Secretary and RCM Journalism Awards Chair Rod Reyes, will sit as panel of judges.

Awardees will each be given a plaque, digital recorder, books and trainings on international humanitarian law and conflict reporting. Entries may be submitted until March 12, 2011. Winners will be chosen from 32 finalists. Winners will be announced on Red Cross Day, May 8, 2011.

For more information on the Red Cross Awards, contact Allison Lopez, ICRC communication officer, at 0908.8686884, or send an e-mail.

By now Filipinos home and abroad, and witnesses the world over, have a stock of visuals and voices that would mark their experiences of last Aug. 23’s tragic events in the Quirino Grandstand in Manila. A tall, proud tourist bus, its sides emblazoned in bold Chinese characters, became the unwitting battleground between a kidnapper and his hostages, an ex-cop and his desperation for reinstatement, two TV networks in perpetual one-upmanship, and really, a nation and whatever is left of its pride and reputation.

Some may remember the image of the Hong Kong national tearfully exiting the bus, raising hope that the lives of all remaining hostages were safe. Others might recall the thickly accented English of Manila Vice Mayor Isko Moreno in his CNN interview and his boastful and cringeworthy description about how the hostage taker had been ‘neutralized’ by Philippine police.

As a sociologist of the media, my personal recollections would also extend from the sights and sounds of television and radio to discussions in Facebook and Twitter. For here, in these increasingly robust social spaces, it is perhaps easier to trace how indeed Filipinos tried to make sense of the shock and threat of what had happened.

At the beginning of the crisis, it was curious how online users all remarked about the strangeness of it all: “OMG. I thought this could only happen in the movies”. “It’s like a bad reality show.” “Don’t our police play the videogame Counterstrike?” Indeed, in tragedy, it is normal to say that it is simply like the movies, like Hollywood. There is the natural desire to push the threatening to the realm of pop culture, to the world of fantasy and make-believe.

But as the late media scholar Roger Silverstone says, it is still mainstream media–television–that is most central in times of crisis. In the midst of fear and uncertainty, live news and its rolling narration and speculation could offer comfort to its audiences that the shocking could still be made into sense. He says, despite the unpredictability that terror and tragedy pose, news media always have a “stock of images, frames and narratives” that will “hold as well as explain.” He further argues that “the familiar” is used “to soften the blow” as there is “safety in the cliché.”

In Aug. 23’s events, what indeed were “the familiar” and “the cliche” in news reportage? And what kinds of comfort, if any, did they provide?

The first cliche that I took note of was the spectacle that the media made of the tragedy. This they achieved as a result of the discomforting proximity that they enjoyed in relation to the sites of drama and action. By now we are familiar with the angle that hostage taker Rolando Mendoza had acted calmly and respectfully to his hostages right until he saw and heard, through the aid of a television from within the hijacked bus, the arrest of his brother and the wailing hysterics of his relatives–all under the bright lights of news cameras. Here the media were literally too close: reporters’ microphones hovered like vultures to the prone bodies of Mendoza’s shirtless brother and his wife, as they refused to get up from the ground and surrender to the police. Later, ABS-CBN talk show host Tintin Babao would also tweet how Susan Enriquez, a reporter from rival network GMA, supposedly trespassed police cordons in order to get “exclusive” updates. And, astutely, CSI fans pointed out on Twitter how tv cameras contaminated the crime scene in the aftermath of the tragedy. Surely, the standard of “proper distance” that Roger Silverstone requires for the operation of a moral media was unmet in how television became too close to the action and showed too much of the event. As ABS-CBN’s Tony Velasquez defensively replied to some Twitter critics last Monday, “[On television] more is better than less”. But again, surely they could have tried for moderation, for the middleground, for “proper distance”?

The second cliche that ran through the media story of what they called “the Manila Bus Tragedy” was the supreme autonomy and authority that journalists enjoyed throughout the day. The media in the Philippines lack any significant regulation that impinges on media operations. The Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas (KBP/Association of Philippine Broadcasters), which intends to be a self-regulating mechanism for television networks, has no actual legal teeth, as any tv network can in fact choose to withdraw its membership from the body to avoid all sanction. With the exception of moralistic censorship of “sex and violence” coming from the hallowed halls of Movie and Television Review and Classification Board (MTRCB), the media do not answer to government, even though they repeatedly demand the government to answer to them. During the crisis for example, there was primetime news anchor Mel Tiangco’s knowing SWAT expertise: “Tsk, they should have used chain rather than rope” when she saw how the rope intended to break into the bus failed spectacularly. And there was Tintin Babao again all passionate on Twitter: “Is this how our SWAT is trained?” There is nothing wrong with a critical media of course. But what happens if the media can only criticize others with little ability to criticize themselves?

This brings me to the third cliche. In responding to how their broadcasting of the arrest of Mendoza’s brother and their play-by-play coverage at the height of the shootout contributed if not caused the failure of rescue, journalists reverted back to a company line: “We were just doing our job”. The police, they said, should have made the decision to call for a news blackout rather than they themselves making that assessment on their own. It was curious to see again on Twitter how this company line provided for journalists (otherwise unfamiliar and uncomfortable with fielding questions of media ethics) a true and unquestioned “safety in the cliche”. Journalists tweeted and retweeted: “We were just informing the public.” “I hope the police do not blame the media.” “In the past people complained that the media were suppressed. Now people complain we give blow-by-blow coverage”. Indeed, what we hope for from the media post-tragedy is not defensiveness but openness, less adherence to company rules and more awareness of the ambiguous power that they wield. And perhaps most significantly, we hope that the media remind themselves not simply of their rights—their constitutional rights to speak and to show—but also of their obligations—their fundamental human obligations to respect vulnerable others over and above duties to profit and profession.

In recent statements from ABS-CBN and GMA, I find it encouraging that there is a concerted move to “draft guidelines” and “review procedures”. (Though I find it worrisome that, in less official records and in more personal tweets, Head of ABS-CBN News and Current Affairs Maria Ressa would reply to criticism, as if frustrated, “Damned if you, damned if you don’t”). We could only hope that such “guidelines” are less about professional rights and obligations to their so-called loyal viewers than about their humanistic concern for vulnerable others, others whose status as human beings depend completely upon how the media portray them to the rest of the world.

Indeed, the most tragic cliche last Monday was that Philippine media did their job when they should have chosen not to. For to pause and question their usual norms and standards would really have been the braver and more dangerous choice.

Jonathan Ong is currently a final-year doctoral researcher in the Department of Sociology at the University of Cambridge. He is also Lecturer in media studies at the Ateneo de Manila University and Anglia Ruskin University. He has published articles on his research in media ethics, media and migration, and media and youth in top academic journals. His commentary has also been published in Rogue magazine and The Philippine Star.

For more information please contact CMFR:
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THE CENTER for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) reiterates its warning, made in many other instances in the past, that media failure to regulate themselves will invite government intervention.

It is in fact happening now, with the introduction of a bill in the House of Representatives that would require TV and radio networks to delay the airing of broadcasts during crisis situations, in addition to the idea being bandied about that government should impose news blackouts during crises—meaning keep the media ignorant and out of crisis venues.

Both are properly the calls of media organizations, which should have enough sense to know when to delay the airing of broadcasts as well as when to “black out”, the fundamental criterion for the latter being the responsibility not to make an already bad situation worse.

The ethical and professional protocols of both in journalism practice are fairly well-established. These protocols warn against live broadcasts of interviews, police operations and other reports. The same protocols are the result not only of hundreds of years of experience and journalism practice, but also of journalists’ engagement with the contemporary issues of terrorism, conflict, kidnapping, and hostage-taking. Best practice dictates that these protocols be observed. That they were not has led to legislators’ introducing such bills as those mandating delayed broadcasts.

No matter how seemingly well meaning, in the Philippine experience, such bills end up covering more than they originally intended. With public support—and such support is likely given the growing outrage over police mishandling of the August 23 crisis as well as the media’s role in it—such bills will take on lives of their own, and are likely to end up imposing greater restrictions on press freedom itself.

The media must oppose any attempt at legislated journalism ethics, which is a patent contradiction in terms, journalism ethics being a matter of voluntary compliance. But the media must also address their own limitations and failings if they are to deserve and to hold the moral high ground when defending their hard-won freedom from government restraint.

We urge our colleagues to resist blaming the police for not having imposed restrictions on them. The self-regulatory regime in which the media function demands that they do not wait to be told what to do, given the basic responsibility to minimize harm. When the situation began to compromise the hostages, the media should have discontinued live coverage, and to delay broadcasting inflammatory statements and footage.

We ask the media to abandon the urge to excuse themselves and to have the good faith to accept the errors—errors likely to have prolonged the crisis last August 23, and worse, to have contributed to the deaths of nine people—that they committed, and from there to relearn the fundamental principles of covering such situations. The first imperative is to assume that any hostage-taker, terrorist, etc., is media-savvy enough—and in fact often count on the media to help further their cause—to monitor TV and radio broadcasts.

That principle was either forgotten, or was never really known, by the three leading networks last Monday, as a consequence of which they aired detailed accounts of police operations including SWAT team deployments, and aired live the arrest of the hostage-taker’s brother which could have triggered the shooting of the hostages. Claims that it did not do so—the hostage taker may have started shooting because he saw the police arresting his brother, or he fired because the police fired first, etc.—are irrelevant and miss the point: given the unpredictability of hostage-taker or terrorist reactions to TV or radio broadcasts, the point is to assume that he or she is monitoring the media and could therefore react to media reportage or commentary in unpredictable ways.

Resistance to government regulation can only be meaningful if the media honor the self-regulatory regime that the constitutional protection to press freedom so clearly demands. A review by the media of the principles involved in that regime, the events of Monday indicate, is called for so that there can be a reasonable certainty that in similar, future crises, media coverage will not make an already bad situation worse—and in furtherance of the core ethical principle of not causing, or, at the very least, minimizing, harm.

Branch 54 of the Manila Regional Trial Court (RTC) cleared former Senior Police Officer Apolonio Medrano and Basilio Yadao of charges for the murder of Ilocos Norte-based broadcaster Roger Mariano in 2004. The decision was signed on 06 August 2010 and promulgated 11 August 2010. (Read CMFR’s case profile on the killing of Roger Mariano here.)

Mariano was on his way home from the dzJC radio station when armed men attacked him along the national highway in San Nicolas, Ilocos Norte on 31 July 2004. Mariano was allegedly looking into suspected anomalous transactions at the local electric cooperative before he was killed. His widow Alma Mariano asked that the case against the alleged gunmen be transferred to Manila in 2005 for fear that the witnesses could be influenced by the accused. Her request was granted and the trial resumed in 2006.

Branch 54 Judge Reynaldo Alhambra said in his 06 August 2010 decision that the prosecution failed to prove beyond reasonable doubt that the accused were the same men who attacked and killed Mariano.

The judge also said that the identification of the accused was “certainly difficult, if not impossible” to establish. His decision enumerated the testimonies of eye witnesses and said that “their narrations may have been embellished to the point that these are contrary to the natural and logical consequences of what they claimed to have been the events that transpired that night.”

“In this case, the quantum of proof required to justify a conviction for a criminal offense was not satisfied by the prosecution. Thus, the Court has no option but to uphold the constitutional presumption of innocence in favor of the accused.”

Mariano’s relatives were disappointed with the result of the trial. “We are very saddened by the decision and we felt that we were robbed of the justice we deserve. It’s frustrating for us and makes us question the integrity and credibility of our justice system,” a family representative told the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.

They expressed their appreciation of the support of media advocacy groups, and are consulting their lawyer to determine their next course of action.

- So far, President Benigno Simeon “Noynoy” Aquino III has been doing a great job communicating with the public and the media. He has brought to the presidential press conference a refreshing style, relaxed and easy, readily providing a lot of information and sharing his thoughts even when he is still thinking out his position. When he does this, he reveals an inclination to think around the subject, the problems that may make it difficult to implement desired action.

Even in these cases, he speaks often with a speed that easily overtakes the pace of recording and note-taking. While making a point, he drops leads to other stories that the press could follow through but in this initial stage most of them are working hard just to catch up. This president calls on the members of the Malacañang beat to “Listen up!” referring them to statements he had made before. Subtext: You can’t cover me cold, you have to remember the context, you have to come to this conversation knowing something about what I have been talking about, so that we’re not just going around in circles.

But he has been cordial and even-tempered and the press seems to feel glad of the change in the presidential style. Seen as a reticent public figure, he has come foreward to disarm and to charm. And the press and public have readily warmed to his approach.

He has promised frequent press conferences, a direct reversal of his predecessor’s custom to leave all the talking to her press officers. Tracking his exchange with the press, one glimpses the character he has brought to this high office and the qualities that hopefully will be the hallmarks of his term. The humility of this public servant is clearly not a role he has taken for show. He has always been self-effacing, and had indeed been seen as a dubious candidate because of the laid-back style. His words, uttered as though he were having a private conversation with people he knows well, are not scripted for effect. The lack of conceit and artifice combines with a readiness to speak his mind, and the mind has proven quick and nimble, with serial figures tippling from his tongue and policy options flowing from some neatly kept mental file.

He has not shirked any question. It is as though he had already asked these questions himself. And his answer comes first from the heart. Where am I on this question? What do I really want to do? Then, how do I make this policy? And the words flow with a directness that is breathtaking. He has processed the “technicals” to make these understandable to someone who has not given the subject the same kind of thought.

All these suggest a leader who is ready to govern in an information age and all its difficulties, someone who thinks of information as critical to sound policy making because that is where the search for solutions must begin. He has shown that he wants to share his plans and he sees the shared framework of understanding as critical to effective implementation. It is also clear that he is ready to engage the public so they too can take part, learn and contribute to the solution of the many problems we face.

Clearly, he has come to the presidency with clean hands and has nothing to hide himself. He has knowingly reached out to the masses, those who voted him to power, the ordinary man and woman struggling to make a living and wanting so much for a better life.

President Aquino is painfully aware that he will not be able to deliver everything he would like, nor fulfill all expectations. But he is all set to try and hopes to be understood should he fail.

The Press and the media
The term Media is currently used to refer to what used to be called the Press, the fourth estate, the pillar of democracy. It is the press and not media in general that plays the role of informing the public as citizens, not the audience for entertainment and distraction that make up so much of what media offers.
PJR Reports observes this distinction as a matter of necessity, as the purpose of the media monitor is to help develop a press that help to form a public forum for the exchange of ideas and news required in a democratic system of government.

A leader of a democracy may use the media to transmit information as a kind of theatrics to help popularize the message and to secure the consent of the governed. But President Aquino is a few steps ahead of all that. For him, communication is the core mechanism of governance in an information age. Both government and the people must use the public forum so they can work together to eventually bring about solutions, whether in the short or the long term.

Nation-building has become a vague word with little meaning. But there is no other word to use when referring to the partnership of the elected and their constituencies. Everyone is a stakeholder and stakeholders will have to take part in the process, articulating other options or expressing their approval or disapproval of considered options.

Inevitably, some solutions will require give-and-take among the various publics. Communication builds consensus. Participation in well rounded discussions of the most difficult issues makes it possible for the many to agree. Such an agreement would not be possible without communication.

The public forum
The quality of that public forum is often determined by the integrity and competence of public officials, who, whether we like it or not, are the most “credential-ed” sources of news and information. As such, they tend to dominate much communication space.

The press also plays a role. They could facilitate public understanding or cause confusion, picking up on color rather than the substance. Reporters covering President Aquino should bring to their job more appreciation of policy process and policy news. Given the difficulties left by the past administration, there will probably be more policy dilemmas to explain to the public, and more solutions that will involve some hardship than we would like.

Journalists in the Philippines have had much practice in covering political tension and crisis and physical calamities. Many turn to the media to know what the latest developments are, to be current and in the know. Providing live coverage, broadcast journalists have proven a great capacity to endure physical difficulties while getting information in hostile terrain. On another front, investigative reporting in the Philippines is probably among the best in the Asia, some of it competes with the best in world; although there are only a few true proponents of the kind that searches out evidence and sheds light on things that corrupt officials keep hidden.

But there is much to improve in the daily reporting on government.

In reporting on this administration and the many challenges it faces, the press is also called upon to shift from the conventional news frame of events happening, the mere recitation of statements from various sources, or even the cheap search for the quote of the day or the soundbyte that will be picked up by the prime time news. Reporters should push journalistic inquiry to another level, an interpretative and analytical frame that refers readers and audiences to context, to varying perspectives and to the inter-connectedness of beats, of issues, and yes, of problems.

Because conflict attracts, it serves as a requirement for an interesting story. We have come quite used to the style of reporting that tells policy conflicts as though it were a sport, specifically, the sabong or cockfight, where one or the other combatant must be vanquished.

Good governments are increasingly driven by diverse and competing needs to find “win-win” solutions, though perhaps not always to the satisfaction of all. These solutions should consider long term impact as well as the constituencies who are negatively affected or positively favored. The poor must figure most in the latter.

To explain these processes calls for reporting that is buttressed by technical understanding of the issue at hand. These subjects must be made interesting and relevant to hold the attention of the lay person. Modern reportage has relied more and more on well conceptualized graphs and charts to clarify the meaning of figures and statistics and to demonstrate projected gains and losses.

There are few periods in a nation’s history where a reform agenda has provoked so much public interest and excitement. So far, the president has indicated an openness that suggests his belief that information must be shared. What will the press do about this initiative? We can only hope that this generation of journalists rises to the challenge that the president has thrown them.

The press office
An extension of the president’s office, the office of the press secretary forms the third component of information-based governance. Every president in the modern age has relied on communication officers. In fact, it is one of the first decisions a president-elect makes. Who will assist me in speaking to the people? And the press secretary and spokesperson appear at his or her side in some kind of seamless choreography.

Ironically, this has not been true in President Aquino’s case.

In line with the purpose of communicating his agenda, President Aquino announced before his inauguration the decision to re-structure the office of the press secretary as it exists. At this writing, a communications team with three heads has been announced: former ABS-CBN News Channel (ANC) public affairs anchor Ricky Carandang will “handle the communications and messaging aspects” while Herminio Coloma will handle the Philippine Information Agency, National Broadcasting Network (NBN-4), Radio Philippines Network (RPN-9) and International Broadcasting Corp. (IBC-13), both ranking as Secretaries of the Presidential Communications Group. Lawyer Edwin Lacierda, meanwhile has already been visible as presidential spokesperson.

The time in which it had taken the president to actually make this official hints at conflicts of turf among members of his campaign family. Some columnists and many bloggers have referred to Maria Montelibano, who handled media relations for the Aquino campaign as a power player in the situation. Montelibano, an Aquino relative, cannot be appointed herself.

In grappling with the message, who will make the decision? If there is no primus inter pares, who will call the shots and who will be held accountable? The president usually indicates the point or drift of the message, but he cannot uphold this critical front by himself. And the last thing he needs is a team whose members are fighting among themselves.

The mortality rate of press officials is one of the highest in government, here as in Washington DC where the work has been developed to an art or a science. The hothouse environment in which press secretaries work, the constant hounding by the media all lead to eventual burnout. They deal with fluid situations, requiring quick skills and grace under pressure. But the stress will cause embarrassing blunders which could force even good people to take their leave.

In this country, the institutional levels of policy setting and operation are still very much captive to the limitations of politicians and the culture of government, a reason officials with very poor skills have been able to take the position. Sometimes, all they need to do is keep mum and please the president. Press secretaries are often left out of policy discussions, or given impossible situations, such as obvious wrongdoing in office, are left mouthing nonsense. They become talking heads trying to fan the hot air.

The president had earlier said the team was working on an overall communication strategy. Another described the re-structuring to distinguish the tasks of “messaging” and the “dissemination” of the message. The public will see clearly on the national stage what results from the first. As for the dissemination, the different publics on the end of the delivery service of Philippine News Agency (PNA) and Radyo ng Bayan (People’s Radio) will see be the only ones to see what is delivered to them.

Information as propaganda
Every administration has had to figure out what to do with the Marcos legacy of propaganda agencies. Even when re-constituted under different names, these agencies have remained government PR machines, and government information which is a legitimate function serves little purpose except to enhance the image of incumbent officials, using spin and damage control when bad news breaks out. Unfortunately, most of these have proven quite inept even in this dubious service.

But by sheer presence, these agencies are effective in spreading the news in the local communities, and the faces and personalities that they present will be retained in memory for the next election. Unfortunately, these dubious purposes are funded by tax payers’ money which can be lost or wasted in corruption.

It would be more in keeping with the new administration’s purpose, to unload channels 9 and 13. As for NBN-4, there is a charter bill languishing somewhere that could be reviewed for the purpose of establishing a television station network like the BBC or PBS. There may be sense in exploring this option, given the investments made to keep up NBN-4.

But the problems will be larger than these questions. In terms of governance, communicating in an information age involves working out the terms of discussion in the midst of constant turbulence, those that come with the character of multiple information flows, or created by political opponents, along with the noise of the Internet, of Facebook, Twitter and the blogs. The most technology savvy manager of information must realize that the tools out there can and will be used to confound.

The beginning for the press team has not been auspicious. It may be too early to discuss the issues they are grappling in terms of power-sharing, but they will not succeed in facilitating the reform agenda, unless they share completely the values and the vision of the president.

Transparency and accountability, the leveling of the playing field, the recognition of citizens as constituent stakeholders – these values and more will be the test of the team as communicators in the service of the president and the people. – With research by Ruby Shaira F. Panela