Criminalizing criticism: More hardships for suffering public

THE INHUMANE treatment of people violating quarantine protocols has exposed the Philippine National Police (PNP) as an agency without heart. (See monitor: “Editorials assail abuses during lockdown”) The administration has shown another aspect of its heartlessness, wielding the law to silence criticism and with uniformed officials at the forefront of the effort to control free speech and further shrink what little is left of democratic space.

On May 11 Ronnel Mas, a 25-year-old public school teacher in Zambales, was arrested without a warrant over his post on social media when he jokingly offered a reward of PHP50 million for the killing of President Rodrigo Duterte. The following day, May 12, Ronald Quiboyen, a 40-year-old motorcycle-for-hire driver in Boracay Island was arrested for saying he will double the PHP50 million offer and give PHP100 million for anyone who will kill the president.

On May 13, Reynaldo Orcullo, 41-year-old salesman in Butuan City, Agusan del Norte was arrested – also without a warrant – for calling the president crazy in a Facebook post. On the same day, authorities arrested Maria Catherine Ceron, a 26-year-old woman who also posted online that she was willing to pay PHP75 million to someone who would kill the president.

Mas, Quiboyen and Ceron are facing sedition charges while Orcullo is facing a cyber-libel charge.

Some reported the most recent incidents as a part of a continuing pattern, connecting the recent arrests to cases of actions to punish free speech. Repression of basic human rights must not be reported as though these were ordinary crimes. Journalists should highlight the big picture — the habitual assault by state forces on the citizenry’s right to free expression. 

CMFR does not endorse the use of foul language or hate speech on any platform or in any sphere. Such practices get in the way of constructive and necessary debate. But in advocating respect for free expression, CMFR has consistently stood for the protection of free speech including speech that may offend. 

In a time of crisis, there is a greater need for the free exchange of views because public dialogue enhances the search for solutions. While dialogue is most productive when done with civility and mutual respect, it can only be free if unfettered by fear of punishment.

For the police to decide that certain types of speech qualify as sedition signals a terrifying tendency and dark inclinations among law enforcement agents to do as they please and to depart from their obligation to observe due process.

ACT Teachers Party-list Secretary General Raymond Basilio said Mas “obviously does not have 50 million to pay as bounty, hence his post clearly does not pose any serious threat to the President.” None of these netizens had the means to substantiate the force of their posts. What they expressed, the frustration in these difficult times, reflected no more than their disapproval of the president’s leadership.  Such expressions happen to be protected by the Philippine constitution.

CMFR monitored primetime newscasts (ABS-CBN 2’s TV Patrol, GMA-7’s 24 Oras, TV5’s One Balita, and CNN Philippines’ News Night), leading broadsheets (Philippine Daily Inquirer, The Philippine Star and Manila Bulletin) and selected online news sites from May 11 to 21.

Valuable insights online

TV and print coverage of the recent arrests over social media posts treated the incident as straight news. For the most part, the media followed the police narrative, with only a few daring to stray from it by citing what some groups had to say, assailing the arrests. These included the Free Legal Assistance Group (FLAG), Karapatan and the ACT Teachers Party-list.

Most reports did not even include the question which should have been at the top of one mind: should the “threats” be taken seriously at all? Clearly, a public school teacher, a motorcycle driver for hire do not have the means to raise the kind of money they were “offering.”

Some online reports by the Inquirer.net, MB.com.ph and Rappler highlighted valuable insights regarding the arrests.

On May 14 Chel Diokno, lawyer and dean of De La Salle University’s College of Law, pointed to the illegal arrests. He said on his Facebook page that “It is not the job of the PNP to protect the President from people’s opinion.” Further, “the limited authority given to the arrest without warrant is only for crimes that occur in their presence or for hot pursuit. Crimes like libel (specially those where no complaint is filed) were never meant to be the subject of warrantless arrests.”

Laywer Christian Monsod, one of the framers of the 1987 Constitution also weighed in on the arrest of Orcullo saying “Whether libelous or not is for a court to decide, not the police.”

Rep. France Castro (ACT Teachers Party-list) observed the double standard being used by law enforcement agents. Quoted by Inquirer.net, Castro said “pag pangulo ang nag ti threat okay lang, ‘pag karaniwang tao, kulong.” (“When the president makes threats it’s fine, but ordinary folk get arrested.”

Authorities have arrested netizens in the previous months because of their online posts. (See Box)

The larger picture

CMFR cheers pieces on Rappler, the Philippine Daily Inquirer and The Philippine Star for reporting with more detail the shrinking democratic space during the lockdown and the draconian measures to control citizen’s free expression.

Rappler published “Policing a Pandemic: Philippines still stuck with drug war blueprint” on May 1, noting that human rights abuses during the lockdown “stem from a culture of impunity that has dominated the country since the violent drug war began in 2016.” Rappler reported that the police have been following the rules imposed by their operational manual that they have been using in the anti-illegal drug campaign. The report said that at some point in the drug war, human rights officers were required to be present in police operations but “this development has not been replicated for quarantine law enforcement.” (see also: “In PH pandemic, Due process for allies, warrantless arrests for the rest”)

The Philippine Star’s May 18 editorial “Democratic space” noted the shrinking freedom online and called on the government to focus on containing the pandemic “and let people cooped up in their homes enjoy democratic space.” It observed how the PNP and NBI “earnestly pursued the suspected authors of the statements, and promptly indicted them for violation of the Cybercrime Prevention Act.”

Favoring a more lenient approach, the editorial argued: “Clearly, none of those arrested could even imagine earning that kind of money on their current means of livelihood. Already suffering from the pandemic, they now have the additional burden of litigation.”  The Star also expressed hope for the same zeal applied to those who threaten critics of the administration online.

The Philippine Daily Inquirer’s report “‘War’ mindset in pandemic response alarms rights watchers” on May 21also likened the government’s COVID-19 approach to its war against illegal drugs.

The Inquirer spoke with health experts and human rights advocates who observed that the government had espoused a war framework from the beginning.

Nymia Pimentel Simbulan of the Philippine Human Rights Information Center said “The government has treated the pandemic as a problem of law and order.” She added “Like in a war, the rule is obedience.”

Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch observed: “This health crisis will inevitably subside but autocratic governments’ dangerous expansion of power may be one of the pandemic’s most enduring legacies.”

UP Manila’s Dr. Gene Nisperos, a community medicine specialist and assistant professor, told the Inquirer that Filipinos are in the dark and this did not help them understand what the government is doing, but if they understand the necessities, they will comply with orders. Nisperos said the government must adopt a health approach centered on human rights in order to defeat the pandemic. The perceived threat against the president from mostly poor or ordinary folk clearly with limited means should have stoked pity in the heart, rather than the penchant to punish. How often do men and women say things to exaggerate their point? Which is why freedom of speech is given such latitude by a democratic constitution. It is what makes us human.