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BAGUIO CITY: Sixteen Baguio-based journalists filed a
petition-in-intervention before the Supreme Court in connection with
the P10-million class suit filed by Manila-based journalists against
further threats and future arrest of journalists.
The journalists led by noted human rights lawyer
and Baguio Midland Courier columnist Pablito Sanidad said the
threats and intimidation by ranking government officials, including
police and military officers, against journalists after the Manila
Peninsula Hotel rebellion on November 29 affects all journalists
nationwide.
“Freedom of the press is not divisible. The
threats they [officials] made and continue to make, as alleged in
the main petition [class suit], are committed against all members of
the Philippine media and thus equally threaten all of them,
including and especially the intervenors, who are members of
provincial media and who are even more vulnerable than their
colleagues in the Metro Manila area,” reads the
petition-in-intervention.
The class suit filed by media organizations in
Manila seeks a permanent writ of injunction and temporary
restraining order against further threats and future arrests of
journalists.
Named respondents in the class suit are Interior
Secretary Ronaldo Puno, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez, Defense
Secretary Gilbert Teodoro Jr., the Armed Forces chief, Hermogenes
Esperon Jr., PNP chief Avelino Razon Jr., and four ranking officials
of the Philippine National Police.
The group that filed the case includes the
National Union of Journalists of the Philippines, the Center for
Media Freedom and Responsibility, and the Philippine Center for
Investigative Journalism, other journalists and media advocates.
Assisted by the Free Legal Assistance Group
through lawyer Noe E. Villanueva, the Baguio journalists said they
do not see anything wrong with what Manila journalists did at the
Manila Peninsula Hotel on November 29.
“They [Baguio journalists] would have done the
same had they been there, as they feel it would have been part of
their duty and functions to gather the news and report the same to
the public who has the right to be informed,” reads further the
petition.
The petition also said that the acts, threats,
warnings, advisories, intimidations of the respondents has greater
chilling effects on provincial journalists because even major and
leading national media outlets and companies and leading journalists
in Manila are not spared from what they called an act to suppress
press freedom.
“Members of the provincial media are the best
witnesses, victims and examples of insidious, dangerous and
widespread chilling effects of the actuations by the respondents as
stated in the main petition,” the petition-in-intervention reads.
-- Harley F. Palangchao
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