Print Monitor

Floored by flour
THE MANILA Times failed to clear the air insofar as lingering fears about products imported from China are concerned.
The Times reported the complaints of the Federation of Philippine Industries (FPI) following the refusal of the Bureau of Food and Drugs (BFAD) to include flour in the list of products that should be monitored and inspected (“Flour from China under close watch,” Aug. 8).
The alarm bells were sounded by a Wall Street Journal report that linked the deaths of a dozen dogs and cats in the United States to China-made wheat gluten in pet foods. The said gluten reportedly contained melamine, an industrial chemical used as fertilizer and ingredient in plastics.
The continued importation of flour from China was traced to its cheap cost. The Times, however, hardly made sense of the data it obtained from the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) when it compared the “retail prices of flour” and the price of Chinese flour.
The report failed to identify whether retailed flour was homegrown or imported from other countries, or if flour from China was among those retailed.
The confusion—and alarm—was heightened when The Times mentioned that the Philippines imports flour mainly from China and that Chinese flour is priced at P60 less per bag.  Is there a separate selling platform for Chinese flour? The report said the DTI admits to importing flour from China but only the ISO 9000 products, which are cheaper.
The ISO 9000 is a set of quality management standards that ensures the grade of the products.
The report could have asked the BFAD why it refused to subject Chinese flour to inspection. While there was the insinuation that the government was putting the lives of consumers at risk by importing cheap but possibly harmful products, there was no proof to this effect.
The headline was obviously misleading. While the FPI made noise at the BFAD and the DTI, Chinese flour was far from being closely monitored.

Beyond losing
The Philippine Daily Inquirer showed what consistent coverage of the news was all about.
The paper featured John Carlos de los Reyes, the lone winner from the Ang Kapatiran party (Alliance for the Common Good) in the last elections (“Kapatiran’s lone winner keeps party’s flame burning,” Aug. 12).
The front-page story focused on De los Reyes and his stand against a population control measure introduced in his city. De los Reyes won as city councilor in Olongapo City.
According to the Inquirer, De los Reyes’s stance on population was consistent with the tenets of the three-year old Ang Kapatiran, which was founded by a group of Catholic professionals “to bring back the teachings of God into the center of politics.”

Ang Kapatiran generated media coverage in the last polls after it fielded three senatorial candidates—Martin Bautista, Zosimo Paredes, and Adrian Sison—who attracted a sizable number of votes because of the ideals they represented.

Missing voice
The Philippine Chronicle report on the budget cuts in the judiciary was supposed to clarify earlier reports insinuating that these were retaliatory tactics against Chief Justice Reynato Puno (“Palace not retaliating with sliced Supreme Court budget,” Aug. 7). It lacked a very important input in the story—the reaction of the chief justice.
The report quoted budget secretary Rolando Andaya Jr. saying that the P1-million slash in the judiciary’s budget and the non-allocation of funds for the construction of the Manila Hall of Justice in the 2008 Appropriations Act had nothing to do with the summit on extrajudicial killings called by Puno last July 16 and 17. Most extrajudicial killings have been largely blamed on the military and the national government.
The ouster of Commission on Higher Education chairman Carlito Puno, the chief justice’s brother, further fueled speculations about Malacañang’s alleged strong-arm tactics.
The Chronicle used the two incidents as background for its story. It sought the opinions of Senate Majority Floor Leader Francis Pangilinan, who gave additional information on the issue of extrajudicial killings. Curiously, it did not give any space to the chief justice’s reactions.

Staying with the story
The Philippine Daily Inquirer is helping Filipinos remember lessons from life-altering events such as environmental disasters.
Exactly a year after the oil spill in Guimaras, the Inquirer published a two-part special report on the island (“Guimarasnons still ask: Where are the fish?”, Aug. 11). The front-page story focused on the plight of the locals who were displaced by the oil spill, as well as the environmental and economic effects of the incident. Additional stories on the oil spill’s effect on the local residents were also in the issue’s “Across the Nation” section.
Part two dwelt on the need to institute major reforms to prevent similar incidents and the question over the liabilities of accountable parties in the oil spill (“Guimaras: Lessons learned but justice remains elusive,” Aug. 12).
For a few days after the special report, the Inquirer continued to publish stories related to the environmental disaster.

Like scraping the bottom of a barrel
THE PHILIPPINE Star found the flattering remark of Sen. Anna Consuelo “Jamby” Madrigal about Sen. Juan Miguel Zubiri’s bottom worthy of space in its front page last Aug. 14. Yes, the Star reported on a senator’s behind on page one.
What was so important about Madrigal’s appreciation of a male colleague’s buttocks to be on the front page, the Star did not explain. It said Madrigal’s compliment was consistent with the polite way Britons praised that part of the body. The report noted that Madrigal had not always been well-mannered, using the word “ass” to express her frustrations over her colleagues who readily cooperated with Senate President Manuel Villar.
The Star’s fascination with the topic did not stop there. It had a follow-up story the next day, with Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile asking why his posterior was not being complimented by Madrigal, and Sen. Miriam Santiago expressing surprise over Madrigal’s comment.

Finding the reason
THE PHILIPPINE Star had the wrong lead in the story about the destruction of smuggled luxury vehicles by the Bureau of Customs (BOC).
In its Aug. 17 issue, the Star said a “legal reason” prevented the BOC from destroying 14 of the most expensive vehicles scheduled for wrecking. It did not say what the legal impediment was. The paper interviewed finance secretary Margarito Teves, who said the government must follow the proper procedures in disposing of the vehicles. It quoted Teves as saying that confiscated products could be either auctioned or destroyed.
The following day, the Star reported that according to justice secretary Raul Gonzalez and presidential legal adviser Sergio Apostol, there was no legal impediment to the government’s decision to destroy seized contraband items. It cited a memorandum issued by Gonzalez which said that the Tariff and Customs Code had a provision granting government officials the prerogative to determine how to dispose of confiscated items. The clarification was prompted by observations that the government could have benefited more if it chose to auction the vehicles instead.
The Star report made it appear that some of the vehicles were not destroyed because the government’s only option in disposing of confiscated smuggled goods was through an auction. As it turned out, the vehicles were spared because their importers were able to secure a temporary restraining order from the court.

On keeping count
THE MANILA Times was quite reckless with facts in its report about a recent attack against another member of media (“Motive suspected to be ‘personal’: Station manager survives slay try,” July 26).
According to the report, Ferdinand Yngson, station manager of GMA-7 Network’s Super Radyo dySB based in Bacolod City, was shot by a local government official in Negros Occidental last July 25. He survived the shooting.
The Times said Yngson’s case “is the first attack on a media man after several years.”  It noted that international media watchdogs Reporters Without Borders and International Press Institute tagged the Philippines as only second to Iraq as the most dangerous place for journalists.
The attack on Yngson was actually preceded by several attacks against and killings of journalists since 1986, which worsened during the Arroyo administration.
This year alone, five journalists have been murdered, one of whom was most likely killed because of his work. There have been at least 20 reported cases of work-related attacks against journalists this year, including death threats, legal charges, arrest, imprisonment, and physical assault. Last year, six media practitioners were killed in the line of duty, according to the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility.

Speaking of Tolstoy
Malaya’s bias against energy secretary Angelo Reyes was very obvious in its Aug. 4 issue.
In the article “How many offices does a secretary need?,” Malaya reported that Reyes has started throwing his weight around at the Department of Energy even before his first day in office.
The report was based on the say-so of an anonymous energy official who said Reyes had requested for office spaces in the Philippine National Oil Co. (PNOC), the National Power Corp., and the National Transmission Corp., aside from his office at the Department of Energy.
Malaya claimed that Reyes rejected the office offered by PNOC president Pedro Aquino and demanded that he occupy Aquino’s room instead. The new energy secretary reportedly yelled at Aquino because he wanted the office vacated immediately since he would be moving in the next day. Neither Reyes nor Aquino was interviewed to confirm or deny the incident.
An anonymous official was quoted as saying that 20 more employees cried after the incident and said they missed the mild-mannered former secretary, Raphael Lotilla, the predecessor of Reyes.
The report ended with a description of the short story “How Much Land Does a Man Need?” by Russian novelist Leo Tolstoy. The story was about a man whose greed for land led to his death.

Watch those numbers
MALAYA had its University Athletics Association of the Philippines basketball history all mixed up. Last Aug. 7, the newspaper reported that the University of the East (UE) twice failed to capitalize on the twice-to-beat advantage, having been beaten by the lower-seeded Ateneo de Manila University in 2002 and 2006.
UE was indeed defeated by Ateneo in a semifinals match-up but only in 2002. The team that defeated UE in the 2006 Final Four round was the University of Santo Tomas.

Wrong date
GIVEN THE attention devoted to stories about the insurgency in Mindanao, it is surprising that The Daily Tribune still can’t keep track of basic information.
Last July 25, The Tribune said the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF) has been at war with the government for the past 25 years (“AFP, MILF urged to keep mum on Basilan conflict”). The following day, the paper dated the MILF struggle at 29 years (“MILF warns of escalated war; troops wait for assault signal”).
A breakaway group from the Moro National Liberation Front, the MILF led by Hashim Salamat was formed on Dec. 26, 1977—or 29 years ago (“The Media and Peace Reporting: Perspectives on Media and Peace Reportage,” Office of the Presidential Adviser on the Peace Process and the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility, 2000).

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