FOI: foiled again
Not a priority
Meanwhile, the public—not just journalists—have despaired over the show of presidential indifference to the fate of FOI in Congress. President Benigno S. Aquino III campaigned and won on the promise of transparency and good governance. But Aquino has failed to show that this key to achieving both remains a priority for his administration. For it to have any effect in his campaign against corruption, an FOI Act needs to be passed soon.
Media have quickly noted PNoy’s silence on FOI. Aquino has never mentioned the FOI bill in his State of the Nation Addresses (SONA). Neither has he included it in his list of priority legislation submitted to the Legislative-Executive Development Advisory Council.
It took a while for Malacañang to endorse an FOI bill that advocates could accept. His administration amended the Erin Tañada bill to meet “the need to protect national security matters, to improve the procedure for public access to information, and to review the penalties proposed to be imposed for violations of the law.”
In the Failon Ngayon Aug. 25 episode, Evardone explained the delay in passing the bill pointing to the contentious issues, which include the list of information that may not be released to the public and the safeguards against possible abuse. Speaking in Filipino: “I’m not the one blocking the bill: I can’t decide on it on my own. Besides it’s not our President’s priority, although the Speaker said it should be.”
He added: “But there is no party stand. If Liberal Party has a party stand, (then there is) no problem. I toe the line.” Evardone, Tañada, Belmonte, and Aquino all belong to the Liberal Party.
ROR rider
Although current versions of the FOI bill in the House and the Senate do not contain an ROR rider, some representatives are likely to demand its inclusion when—or if—debates on the floor start.
ROR is seen by its critics as a trade-off, giving anti-FOI legislators a piece of the pie, the tit for their tat, an exchange of favors the politicians are insisting on to get their bills passed.
The right to reply has to do with anyone, a politician or any other subject who is reported on in the news to respond to any criticism, or reporting that is unfair or incomplete in the telling. It is not logically connected to concept of FOI.
Antonino had argued for the inclusion of an ROR provision in the FOI bill last Nov. 27 House Committee hearing: “I am not against freedom of information, I only believe that freedom of information should come with a responsibility to use that information responsibly.”
According to Antonino and other Committee members, they have been subjected to media “criticism” and felt that they were not given the opportunity to reply. They mentioned bias and corruption, among other media faults. They say, the ROR provision would compel the media to be fair and balanced—on the mistaken assumption that only the media, rather than the entire public, is entitled to access to information.
The President sees no danger with an ROR law, speaking in Filipino: “If every news report presented both sides, if it is accurate, and if every Filipino were given the chance to form his own views and to decide on matters of social concern, then journalists have nothing to fear from a Right of Reply law.” (38th Top Level Management Conference of the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas, Nov. 15)
But no less than the United Nations Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Opinion and Expression cautioned against a government-mandated ROR: “If a right of reply system is to exist, it should ideally be part of the industry’s self-regulated system, and in any case can only feasibly apply to facts and not to opinions.” (http://www.article19.org/pages/en/right-of-reply.html)
In an interview, Philippine Daily Inquirer columnist Conrado de Quiros echoed the same sentiment explaining: “Is media also at fault? Arguably, yes…. But the right of reply does not make things better, it makes things worse. To be able to cure these things, you have to rely on the decent people inside the media to uphold its standards. They can raise a collective voice to criticize, scorn, and even damn the wrong practices.” (News Café, Solar News Channel, Nov. 30)
CMFR has argued that ROR is already an ethical requirement for good journalism, and is against criminalizing the failure to provide a “reply,” which would happen if the obligation is a legal one. It adds that supporters of the ROR should argue its merits in a separate bill, and that to put it in an FOI bill is another example of bad law-making.
Malaluan also reminded public officials that it is “Every Filipino’s right to information now falls victim to the administration’s beef with media.
“It has to be stressed that FOI is not for the media alone. It is for pensioners who seek to clarify inaccuracies in their service records, for would-be beneficiaries who follow-up on the status of their claims to government services; for students and academics who seek hard-to-obtain government data for their research; for workers and farmers who ask for texts of negotiations and decisions that affect their livelihoods; and for ordinary citizens who want to know how their hard-earned taxes are spent by government.
“Citizens’ direct access to information—perhaps, there lies the fundamental fear of FOI.” (“Rolling in the Deep: The Right of Reply Monkey Wrench in FOI”)
CMFR, along with other advocates, sees the need for FOI legislation as an instrument for widening access to information—thus allowing for the active engagement and participation of all citizens in decision-making and in governance.
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