Filipina journalist wins RSF Press Freedom award

Photo from Inday Espina-Varona’s Facebook profile

VETERAN FILIPINA journalist Inday Espina-Varona received the Prize for Independence from the international press freedom watchdog Reporters without Borders (RSF- Reporters Sans Frontieres) at the 2018 Press Freedom Awards held in London on November 9.

Varona founded #BabaeAko, a social media women’s rights campaign in response to President Rodrigo Duterte’s misogynistic comments against women. It was recognized by TIME magazine as one of the most influential online platforms in 2018.

RSF also recognized Varona’s reports on child prostitution, violence against women, LGBT (lesbians, gay, bisexual and transgenders) issues and the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) in Mindanao.

Varona is currently a contributing editor for news.ABS-CBN.com and a writer for ucanews.com. She held top editorial positions in The Manila Times and the Philippines Graphic magazine. She was also a former national chairperson of the National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, a Marshall McLuhan and Stanford journalism fellow, and a Jaime V. Ongpin (JVO) awardee.

“After a particularly hard-hitting column, I find 50 to 80 private messages calling me a liar, an ugly woman, and mostly these are sexist attacks,” she told Agence France-Presse (AFP). “The slurs don’t really bother me but the threats that say ‘we know where you live, we’ll see if you are as brave as you think’ – that bothers me because it also happens to other journalists,” she added.

In her acceptance speech, Varona dedicated the recognition to her Filipino colleagues who face threats in their line of work.

“I share this with embattled Philippine colleagues: the 185 killed since the 1986 restoration of a fragile, perpetually threatened democracy, 12 of them in the first two years of President Rodrigo Duterte’s rule,” Varona said during  ceremonies at the Getty Images Gallery. “Independence is very important for citizen journalism. I teach young people to be critical-minded and I hope this award will inspire them,” she said.

In a statement, the NUJP thanked its former chairperson for recognizing the role of independent Filipino journalists in defending and advancing the Filipino people’s rights and liberties.

The NUJP also thanked the awardee for her recognition of journalists who defend democracy “despite the dangers they face, not least from the very forces supposedly sworn to protect and preserve our freedoms.”

RSF’s Prize for Independence is awarded to reporters for resisting financial, economic, political or religious pressure in their work. RSF highlighted the “urgent need” to protect journalists in an increasingly dangerous year for media. Some 63 journalists, 11 citizen journalists and four media assistants have been killed so far in 2018, RSF said, including Washington Post contributor Jamal Khashoggi who was murdered in the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.