Category: aquino admin

A Restrictive Mindset: First Law Since 2000 Affecting Cyberspace Communication

STATEMENT OF THE CENTER FOR MEDIA FREEDOM & RESPONSIBILITY ON THE PASSAGE OF THE CYBERCRIME PREVENTION ACT OF 2012

The successful passage through the legislative mill and their immediate signing into law by President Benigno S. Aquino III of bills affecting the media and their fundamental task of gathering and disseminating information, among them the Data Privacy Act (Republic Act 10173) last August, and the Cybercrime Prevention Act (RA 10175) this September, suggests how restrictive rather than expansive is the mindset of the country’s legislators, and of Mr. Aquino himself when it comes to enshrining in the law those principles—accountability and transparency, press freedom and free expression, etc.—to which he has repeatedly declared he is committed.

RA 10173 and 10175 breezed through both houses of Congress within months after they had been introduced in 2011, and apparently were in no danger of being vetoed once they reached Mr. Aquino’s desk.

The Data Privacy Act, among other provisions, penalizes those in government who release information of a personal nature, which seems a reasonable enough restriction in behalf of the right to privacy—until one recalls that information on the personal lives of government officials often has a bearing on their performance as public servants accountable to the citizenry, and is therefore among the legitimate concerns of the news media.

The Cybercrime Prevention Act, meanwhile, incorporates the 82-year old libel law in the Revised Penal Code (RPC) in including libel among the crimes that may be committed through the use of computers. Under the provisions of the RPC on libel, the penalty for violators is imprisonment of six months for every count of libel committed. Libel as a criminal offense has been used by past administrations as well as local officials today to harass and intimidate journalists. The outstanding example of its use against journalists was the filing by Jose Miguel “Mike” Arroyo of 11 libel suits against 46 journalists during the disputed presidency of his wife Gloria Macapagal Arroyo. And yet Congress has through the decades ignored the demand from journalists and human rights groups for the decriminalization of libel.

Compare the speed with which RA 10173 and RA 10175 were passed—in both instances with only perfunctory public hearings—with the difficulties Congress is having with passing a Freedom of Information Act (FOI), and with Mr. Aquino’s by now obvious aversion to it.

And yet certain honorable members of Congress have not been miserly with their lip service to the alleged need for an FOI. As for Mr. Aquino, since he became President he has stopped talking about the need for one, after pledging during the 2010 campaign for the Presidency that he was all for it in behalf of transparency and as a means of insuring government accountability. The bottom line, apparently, is that neither Congress nor Mr. Aquino want an FOI act passed, period.

The passage of the Cybercrime Prevention Act also suggests among other possibilities that both Congress and Mr. Aquino have chosen to ignore the 2011 declaration of the United Nations Human Rights Committee (UNHRC) that the Philippine libel law is excessive because it penalizes violators with imprisonment, contrary to the human rights protocols to which the Philippines is a signatory, and therefore must at least be reviewed towards decriminalizing libel. Either that, or the authors of the bills, and Mr. Aquino himself, are unfamiliar with both the UNHRC declaration, as well as with the long-standing demand to decriminalize libel in order to put an end to the use of the libel law to intimidate and silence journalists. Apparently there is little hope that libel will ever be decriminalized, RA 10175 having in effect further strengthened it by widening its application.

Finally, a word of caution. RA 10175 is the first law affecting communication through cyberspace that has been passed in this country since the eCommerce Act of 2000. Prior to its passage, the Philippines had been distinguished among its Asian neighbors for the absence of regulatory legislation affecting the Internet. It can signal the opening of the floodgates of Internet regulation that will affect Filipino netizens, given the restrictive mindset of the country’s leaders. It is a distinct possibility to which journalists and bloggers, ordinary citizen and anyone committed to free expression through whatever medium, should be alert, and must be prepared to combat.

sotto’s insolence, budget blues #RH

last wednesday, comedian senator tito sotto wrapped up his turno en contra with a sorry attempt at profundity, lifted, yet again, yes again, this time from a 1966 speech of bobby kennedy, and this time, translated into tagalog, presumably by his staff, and atrociously at that.  when challenged, he reportedly said, marunong pala managalog si kennedy, ha.  josko, parang sinapian ni iskalera of the infamous iskul bukol,  lol.  good job.

nakakadesespera, my mother would say, as in nakaka-despair, na kailangan pang ipaliwanag kay sotto na plagiarism din yon?  kahit pa ipinasalin niya sa tagalog, hindi pa rin kanya ‘yon.  what he did was to appropriate and claim as his not just the sentiments of kennedy re nation and small actions but also the way it was expressed.  and he can’t claim fair use, excuse me, not in an official senate speech where he is on record as saying that everything in his speech was original.

The making of quotations from a published work if they are compatible with fair use and only to the extent justified for the purpose, including quotations from newspaper articles and periodicals in the form of press summaries: Provided, That the source and the name of the author, if appearing on the work, are mentioned;

he says a friend texted him the material.  without attribution to kennedy?  friend ba ‘yon o foe?  o me attribution but sotto thought, ah 1966, wala pang internet noon, wala ito sa google, mwahaha.

the worst of it is, walang sanctions on sotto, the arrogant recidivist.  unfortunately, the senate president, the only one higher than sotto in the senate, who is in a position to reprimand the majority leader and his staff for intellectual dishonesty, is on the same anti-RH side as sotto, and, like sotto, all he does is insist that we answer sotto’s points rather than focus on the plagiarism.  but, really, why should we even bother?  sotto’s dishonest; he has lost all credibility.

Ryan Edward Chua ‏@ryan_chua
Sen. Enrile says Senate should not concern itself with Sotto plagiarism issue: “Hindi ko na papatulan ‘yon.”

ganoon.  eh nakakawala din ng credibility ‘yang pagkampi kay sotto at pag-condone ng dishonesty.  where is the enrile of the corona impeachment trial, the one who was so strict about following the law and observing the rules of good manners and right conduct.  ay, teka, he was strict nga lang pala with prosecutors and defense counsel, but allowed fellow senator-judge miriam her rants…  so what happened to HER?  i been waiting for a WHA???  why is she so quiet now, like all the rest?  can it be, as some quarters suggest, that all of them are guilty of plagiarism in one form or another?  so complicit silang lahat?

and then, again, there’s senator drilon, who was supposed to have tweeted this yesterday:

Frank Drilon ‏@FranklinDrilon
Again, I am deeply saddened by the continuous lapse of judgment by the Senate Majority Leader. This House is not a place for mockery. 12:02 pm sept 6

apparently it’s been disowned by drilon, he has no twitter account, says his staff, and i can’t find it anymore.  hmm.  still, the question remains, why is he so quiet?  isn’t this the perfect time to take to the senate floor and challenge enrile’s and sotto’s leadership?  isn’t intellectual dishonesty, and condoning it, ethical grounds for a vote of no confidence?  or can it be that drilon does not want to antagonize sotto et al because the LP will be needing their support for the president’s budget of php 2.0006 trillion, up 10.5 % from 2012’s (1.816T), up 21 % from 2011’s (1.563T), and which leonor briones alleges to be “understated,” that is, short by 449.34 billion in principal amortizations due in 2013, and rife with “hidden and vague” items to the tune of 282 billion, how dishonest, what a coincidence.

obviously there’s going to be a lot of wheeling and dealing between the executive and legislative departments, every one looking out for himself/herself or his/her vested interests before nation’s.  but as in gloria arroyo’s time, kung di maipasa ng konggreso ang 2013 budget, this year’s budget can always be rolled over to next year.  what makes this budget so urgent, given its alleged deficiencies?  what makes it more important than the RH bill, e wala namang garantiya na ikauunlad ito ng bayan.  di bale sana kung naipasa na ang RH bill, at may budget na for the RH law.  instead, ang nasusunod ay ang wishes of 3 out of 10 filipinos and not the wishes of 7 out of 10.  anong klaseng gobyerno at demokrasya ito?

as for sotto and how to make him pay for intellectual dishonesty, it looks like we’re on our own.  like arbet bernardo’s fb status  and thread say:

The Senate Ethics Committee will not act unless a complaint is filed. So if you want to censure Sottocopier, you know what to do.

… at least pag may complaint na and they don’t act on it, para lang silang frat. Eh as of now may palusot pa sila, walang complaint, so they can’t act.

and to my question, where are the cause-oriented lawyers who are usually quick to file complaints? they won’t move on their own? maybe they plagiarize too… arbet’s response was: where is oliver lozano when you need him LOL.

seriously, what happened to civil society?  puro ba na-co-opt na ng aquino admin?  and what about mainstream media?  fence-sitting as always, hanggang reportage lang, walang taking a stand against plagiarism and spreading the word, explaining the immorality of it, down to the masses?  and what about the church, the guardian-kuno of our morals?  okay lang sa kanila sotto’s kind of deceit and duplicity because it’s for the anti-RH cause?  the ends justify the means?  good job.

sotto deserves to be sanctioned, declared in contempt of the people, for intellectual dishonesty.  it wouldn’t be the first time that a sotto is found guilty of contempt and “falsehoods,” by the way.  tila it runs in the family.

cj sereno

first, we lost robredo.
now, we get sereno.
parang sad pareho.

i hope sereno surprises us.  otherwise the coincidence does not augur well for robredo’s legacy.

sooo not worth it

from A tradition not worth it, cito beltran’s column yesterday, in anticipation of the afternoon SONA — a ritual borrowed from the U.S. that Filipino politicians have reinvented and trivialized.

Our local version of SONA has turned into a made for Reality TV event that looks more like a Hollywood Red carpet event where guests dress and behave like they were at a party instead of a serious political event intended to draw the true picture of country’s condition. Even media coverage of the event draws from the styles of US entertainment programs focusing on fashion, looks and social intrigue rather than “Who’s Who” in terms of being responsible for our current state of affairs.

yeah, it’s become so showbiz… all show and tight security…

The House of Representatives always spends extra to dress up the Batasan Pambansa complex. The last time Congress did this, I think they spent over several millions to spruce things up. Then the Philippine National Police and the Armed Forces of the Philippines have to deploy their respective army of security personnel to secure the President and the VIP guests. This takes months of preparation, with cops and soldiers being deployed days ahead, which requires lots of logistics such as vehicles, equipment, not to mention food and utilities, which again costs millions.

From the Palace side, an equal amount of time, work and money is poured into preparing the SONA speech with the help of “consultants”, a lot of work and fine tuning goes into preparing the agenda, guest lists, as well as the media coverage of the event, not to mention expenses for hair, make-up, and outfits of government officials and their spouses.

… and no substance.

On the average we get a 30 to 45 minute sanitized and politicized recap of events and realities that millions of Filipinos have been living in. Rich or poor, most of us don’t want to be reminded of our sorry state of affairs in terms of crimes, under employment, corruption and poverty. Even the so-called good news doesn’t matter much because most of the economic benefits remain limited to the rich and well connected who control business monopolies in the country.

Is it worth several millions of pesos just to hear a few quotable quotes that are read from the teleprompter and not from the heart? Do we need to spend millions of pesos to watch political turncoats serve out 17 to 21 blasts of applause as if they were watching a tennis match? Regardless of who delivers the speech, the sorry fact is, we the Filipino people are paying too much money for a tradition that does not change our state of affairs.

In comparison, the US model has always been crucial to Americans because US Presidents traditionally uses their State Of the Nation Address as a springboard or opportunity to make a major policy decision or announce vital information, which in turn affects investment decisions, political directions or global relations.

this time it was twice longer than average, punctuated by some 100 more blasts of sipsip applause, the longest one when he called for responsible parenthood, perceived as an endorsement of the RH bill, which was nothing of the sort.  the speech itself, if it can be called that, was self-congratulatory (parang he believes his own propaganda), and packed with trivia.  and promises.  even some defensiveness.  but nothing about palparan and human rights, or EPIRA, or FOI, or RH really.  nothing new, nothing surprising, nothing inspiring.  and that’s the state of the nation.