The year that was in the news media
The Corona impeachment trial
The Philippine news media were relentless in their coverage of the Corona impeachment trial during the five months that it lasted, or almost half of 2012.
On May 29, the Senate Impeachment Court (SIC) convicted Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona on Article II of the complaint with a vote of 20 (against 3) guilty as charged.
Article II of the Articles of Impeachment stated: “Respondent committed culpable violation of the Constitution and/or betrayed the public trust when he failed to disclose to the public his statement of assets, liabilities, and net worth (SALN) as required under Sec. 17, Art. XI of the 1987 Constitution.”
Corona admitted that he did not declare in his SALN four dollar accounts (US$2.4 million) and three peso accounts (Php80 million because these were covered by absolute confidentiality under the Foreign Currency Deposits Act (FCDA) and were “co-mingled” funds with wife and children, respectively.
The House of Representatives, with 188 of its 285 members, impeached Corona on grounds of betrayal of public trust, culpable violation of the Constitution, and graft and corruption on Dec. 12, 2011. The House transmitted the eight articles of impeachment to the Senate and the impeachment trial began on Jan. 16.
This was only the second impeachment trial in Philippine history, the first being former President Joseph Estrada’s.
Breaking news, live reports
The Senate, acting as an impeachment court, held the impeachment trial in public, usually conducting hearings from Mondays to Thursdays at 2 to 5 p.m.
Broadcast coverage consisted primarily of breaking news reports and live airing of the proceedings for 44 days. The Senate Public Relations and Information Bureau accredited more than a thousand journalists and media practitioners.
The major media organizations poured resources into the coverage, sending multiple news teams and dedicating news channels, microsites, and/or special report web pages to the coverage of day to day developments. Major developments in the trial landed on the front pages of the broadsheets, and aired as the top stories of broadcast networks and online news sites.
The live and full coverage of the impeachment trial allowed the public to monitor the proceedings firsthand. This was a big event for social networking sites. The public utilized blogs, Facebook, and Twitter to share insights and provide immediate feedback. The new media (Internet) helped fill the gaps in the coverage, breaking the press monopoly over information and serving as the check on old media (print, radio, and television) bias.
Generally fair
The media coverage overall was generally fair, accurate, relevant, and responsive to the needs of the public in understanding the political process.
For its significance, the Corona impeachment trial could not but be covered by the media, despite its “bad news” implications.
Corona and his allies accused the media of “trial by publicity” and doing a demolition job against him. PJRR found there was no indication of institutional bias in the news or opinion pages. However, there were news reports that carried outright expressions of opinion as well as columns and editorials that did take a stand, as they should, for or against Corona.
Media access to independent sources and the paper-trail helped produce in-depth reports that revealed long-standing irregularities in the implementation of laws and the failure of the government agencies and officials to abide by their own and the agencies’ rules and procedures.
Context and analysis
The special reports and commentaries provided the most context and analyses. The media tapped legal experts and produced infographics and primers to shed light on existing laws and the ambiguities in some of them. Because of the media’s reports on the language barrier, the impeachment court conducted the trial in Filipino and reduced the use of legal jargon. The broadcast media also provided sign-language interpreters for the hearing impaired.
There was still a tendency to be reactive. Journalists and media practitioners relied heavily on press conferences, statements, and interviews to report on what transpired daily. But they could very well not have ignored such sources, although in some cases the reports were of the “he-said-she-said” variety, while reporters became vulnerable to the spins of the interested parties.
The failure to corroborate information released by both the prosecution and the defense muddled the issues on the number of real properties/dollar and peso accounts allegedly under the name of Corona and family as well as the story behind the Basa-Guidote Enterprises Inc.
Because the personalities involved were public officials—they were in high ranking positions, wealthy, and powerful—the media coverage also played up several issues for drama. The trial was sometimes depicted as a telenovela (“Coronavela”; working on themes of good and evil, family problems, love affairs, revenge, etc.) or a “boxing match” (win the fight or you lose your wager). These flaws, given the comprehensive reportage on a complex political exercise, were relatively minor.
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