[Media Monitor] When an editor resigns

Matrix image from The Manila Times

On Wednesday, 24 April, the managing editor of the oldest newspaper in the Philippines has tendered his resignation. Felipe “Ipe” Salvosa II left The Manila Times two days after the paper published a report showing a matrix linking media groups to an illusory ouster plot against President Rodrigo Duterte. This matrix is the government's response to the anonymous videos published on Youtube titled "Ang Totoong Narco List (The Real Narcolist)," which is in contrast to the unverified "narcolists" from the President that has implicated public officials and other figures in the illegal drug trade.

Issue

The Manila Times chairman emeritus Dante A. Ang, appointed as Special Envoy of the President for International Public Relations on May 2017, believes that anything coming out from the Office of the President is credible. Even Presidential Spokesperson Salvador Panelo presumes that intel from the President is validated. Panelo had the audacity to say, in Filipino, that it's from the President so people should believe it.

Here are the presumptions that can be filtered from the news article authored by Ang:

• Media outlets are campaigning for the Left to destabilise the government by manipulating the public and enlisting police and military support through the use of fake news.

• The President's satisfaction ratings have remained on "stratospheric" levels for the past three years.

• The Opposition could not accept that support for Duterte is still "stratospheric."

• Media outlets cannot claim to be objective given they receive massive foreign funding. (READ: The debate on Rappler's ownership)

• The media has not refuted the allegations of foreign funding made by "eminent" and deluded writer Rigoberto Tiglao. (Read my Media Monitor reports on Tiglao)

The matrix alleged that online news agency Rappler, fact checking organisation Vera Files, Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism, and human rights lawyers' group National Union of Peoples' Lawyer, have a hidden agenda of organising a coup plot against Duterte. Ellen Tordesillas of Vera Files, the alleged primary link to Bikoy, is being accused of distributing "false narratives" to the aforementioned groups.

Sources

Ang interviewed four sources to reinforce his presumptions and the matrix provided by his Malacañang source.

Source 1, the man who provided the matrix:

Source 1 affirms there is a plot to (a) discredit the President and (b) destabilise the government. He believes there is an “obvious pattern” with media groups publishing anti-Duterte stories, and added that a Duterte-sympathising group involved in the IT business tracked information [in the matrix] from its source to media organizations and sent it to the President. Source 1 links the alleged black propaganda campaign to the Opposition (“Yellows”), and claimed the President’s credibility is high.

Source 2 & 3, “independent” sources:

Source 2 and 3 affirms there is an obvious plot to oust the President. They argued the President’s daughter Veronica cannot possibly be receiving payoffs from drug lords and deposit it in banks in Hong Kong given her age, as what Bikoy accused her and her mother Honeylet of.

Source 4, a media practitioner:

Source 4, presumably a journalist, perhaps gave Tordesillas the benefit of the doubt. As written: “If it is true that Ellen participated in the distribution of the story — whether that is legitimate or otherwise — at the very least, she will be guilty of unethical practice. And if she was paid for doing so, then she would be nothing more than a paid hack, a cheap propagandist, and therefore, fair game for the administration, he said.”

Responses to the resignation

Manila Times on 25 April responded to stories about Salvosa's resignation, reiterating they asked him to resign in contrast to what news outlets wrote as Salvosa resigning after the report's publication. Thing is, there really is no difference. He resigned because he was asked to resign, but Salvosa already had that in mind prior to being told to do so. Ang tired his fingers to writing a postscript to his story, and there is no need to read that further, really. Moreover, the media never omitted the part where Ang asked Salvosa to resign. He just did not read the articles.

Ang is under the impression that Salvosa's tweet is "highly unethical behavior." Salvosa's tweet, which he posted on the day the story was published, stated: "A diagram is by no means an evidence of 'destabilization' or an 'ouster plot.' It is a very huge stretch for anyone to accuse PCIJ, Vera Files and Rappler of actively plotting to unseat the President. I know people there and they are not coup plotters."

Ang explained the ouster plot is a story and he did not accuse anyone: he merely quoted and reported about the matrix. He noted there was no urgent need to have another source, and he did not comment or fill the matrix's inadequacies. He added that publishing stories prior to receiving reactions from parties are commonplace.

Analysis

There is much to unbox in Ang's preconceptions and the sources he interviewed.

In the perception of a pro-Duterte paper and its chairman, the grounds for writing “anti-Duterte” stories do not have a clear definition. Anti-Duterte stories may range from negative news articles on government activities. It may be opinion columns that put the administration in a bad light. Aside from not verifying the matrix and not obtaining statements that contradict the accusations, Ang interviewed sources using questions that support his raging concern for the President. Shooting back source 4’s argument, Ang is just itching to publish an exclusive yet inconclusive story.

Take notice that sources 1 to 3 gave Ang an affirmation that there is a sinister plot against the President. The purpose of adding statements from these three is for Ang to gain the support of like-minded people and strengthen his presumptions listed above.

Sources 2 and 3 defended Duterte's daughter Veronica with a faulty logic, given the administration's war on drugs has affected the youth, and there is a proposition to lower the age of criminal liability. The preposterousness of the accusation made by Bikoy, identified as a black propagandist linked with the “Yellows” and the anti-Duterte media, could only be seen by complaisant old men as part of a plot to destabilise the Government.

If Ang could have redirected his efforts in writing a story, he would have uncovered facts and not supporting statements for his prejudices.

First, he should have investigated how the Duterte sympathisers “tracked the flow of information” shown in the matrix. Other people seemed to have done that tedious job for him.

Second, there is no explanation as to how this matrix could conclude to a coup plot and a campaign to destabilise the government. It links organisations that counter a belief system favouring the President and his cohorts, without substantiating accusations other than statements from the man who gave Ang the matrix and the seemingly omnipotent argument that the President does not lie. It has implicated people whose names were clearly shown, and aside from Tordesillas, none of them were contacted for any comment.

Third, if Ang argues that it is common for reactions to be "printed or aired days after the main story is published," then wouldn't it be unproductive for him to interview these sources?

Ang has no right to slap journalism values on everyone's faces if he can't even do it himself.