Loren to cops: End witch-hunt vs media

Sen. Loren Legarda has urged Camp Crame to abandon its harassment of the media in connection with the Nov. 29 Peninsula Manila hotel standoff.

"We're afraid nothing good and constructive could possibly come out of this witch-hunt," said Legarda, a former broadcast journalist.

"This is definitely upsetting. Our sense is, some quarters in government want to use the Peninsula Manila incident as an excuse for tougher actions against the media later on, in similar crisis-situations," Legarda warned.

Legarda made the statement shortly after the police insisted that Data Batnag, the Philippine correspondent of the Japanese wire service Jiji Press, helped Faeldon escape. The police alleged that Batnag even gave Faeldon a press ID card to ease his flight.

Besides having a new witness against Batnag, the police said they were also trying to persuade other media persons who covered the standoff to file affidavits that would supposedly pin her down.

Batnag has categorically denied helping Faeldon. She earlier challenged the police to file the appropriate charges against her.

Legarda, meanwhile, gladly received the Supreme Court circular discouraging trial judges from handing down prison sentences to journalists convicted of libel, and encouraging the bench to instead impose fines.

Legarda is author of Senate Bill 223, which seeks to abolish the penalty of imprisonment with respect to libel. Instead, the bill proposes to impose bigger fines to discourage the offense.

At present, the penalty for "libel by means of writings or similar means" is imprisonment ranging from one month and one day to six months, or six months and one day to six years, aside from paying a fine ranging from P200 to P6,000.

Under Legarda's bill, the prison term would be abolished. However, the fine would be raised to a range of P100,000 to P300,000.

"While the penalty of a fine must be sustained, for no crime should go unpunished, the penalty of imprisonment has merely served to discourage members of the media from performing their duties with even greater zeal and vigilance," Legarda said.

"Because of the threat of imprisonment, members of the media have been forced to approach their mandates with doubt and hesitation, instead of boldly probing deeper into issues potentially affecting public interest and the general welfare," Legarda lamented.

"We cannot have this in a country where the media are supposed to be at the core of our freedom of speech and expression," Legarda said.

Under the Revised Penal Code, libel is defined as "a public and malicious imputation of a crime, or of a vice or defect, real or imaginary, or any act, omission, condition, status, or circumstance tending to cause the dishonor, discredit or contempt of a natural or juridical person, or to blacken the memory of one who is dead."

Under the law, to be liable for libel, the following elements must be shown to exist: (1) the allegation of a discreditable act or condition concerning another; (2) publication of the charge; (3) identity of the person defamed; and (4) existence of malice.

The law provides that an allegation made by a person against another is considered defamatory if it ascribes to the latter the commission of a crime; the possession of a vice or defect, whether real or imaginary; or any act, omission, condition, status or circumstance which tends to dishonor or discredit or put him in contempt.

According to the law, there is "publication" if the defamatory material is communicated to a third person, that is, a person other than the person to whom the defamatory statement refers. There is "malice" if the author of the libelous remarks made the statement with knowledge that it was false, or with reckless disregard as to the truth or falsity thereof.