Sinning Against the ‘Sin’ Tax Bill

“A foreign lobby has been spreading its tentacles in government and private agencies to push for legislation that would put away (sic) the cigarette industry through a campaign for smoke-free Philippines,” the lead read.

The writer then added his own speculation as to the unverified facts that he had supposedly obtained  from the said documents: “The documents obtained by (MBI) may tend to prove that the $5 million that goes around under different organizations may have gone to the pockets of powerful people in the same way that Sen. Ralph Recto, chairman of the Senate ways and means committee resigned out of delicadeza after Manuel Mamba of Malacañang said that those who would support the cause of the cigarette industry must be taking bribes.”

Recto had been criticized for his “diluted” version of the “sin” tax bill that slashed more than half of the targeted tax revenues from cigarettes recommended by the Department of Finance. (http://www.rappler.com/business/13966-recto-under-fire-for-lower-sin-tax-bill) Recto was accused of a conflict of interest since the largest cigarette manufacturing company has a plant in Batangas where his wife is governor. (http://www.businessmirror.com.ph/index.php/en/news/top-news/607-recto-quits-as-senate-panel-chief-over-sin-tax-bill-version)

Prior to the lobby money report, MBI had already gone out of its way to put on the front-page an opinion column usually in the inside pages to defend Recto. In the piece “Ralph Recto has character”, published last Oct. 17 2012, the writer said: “We have tirelessly explained that the supporters of HB 5727 (the “sin” tax bill) succeeded in sowing public confusion over the Recto report. It is as simple as simple can get, but it was twisted for other people’s advantage.”  (http://www.malaya.com.ph/index.php/opinion/15509-ralph-recto-has-character)

MBI continued to cite anonymous sources in December while its headlines became even more combative. On the Dec. 3, 2012, MBI published the banner news report “Sin tax patently anti-Pinoy” conspicuously placing it beside another news report headlined “Sin tax share to GDP” detailing a statistical study that the excise tax’s share in the country’s gross domestic product had been consistently falling.

The writer mentioned in the banner story, but did not identify, a  senator “who is opposed to the measure, said to have been crafted by (Purisima), (who) told (MBI) that the finance chief and British American Tobacco betray their advocacy of a unitary rate by imposing a uniform number only in the last year.” (http://www.malaya.com.ph/~malayaco/index.php/business/business-news/18957-sin-tax-patently-anti-pinoy) It is unclear if the senator requested not to be identified, but why quote a government source who can’t be identified, assuming it indeed exists?

In comparison

While PJRR is wary of reviewing the content of opinion articles because of their subjective nature, we noted that two other business newspapers drastically differed from MBI. Business Mirror (BM) published only two opinion articles mentioning BAT in the last quarter of 2012, while Business World (BW) published none at all.

Of the 51 “sin” tax-related articles MBI published in the last quarter of 2012, more than half were opinion pieces. BM published 46 “sin” tax-related news reports and opinion articles; and BW, 44.

Comparison of ‘Sin’ Tax-Related Articles in Business Newspapers Q4 2012 by Content