Philippine Press Freedom Is Teetering on the Brink

Maria Ressa, the CEO of the Philippine news website Rappler, was back in court on July 22 to plead not guilty to tax evasion charges, just over a month after she and a former Rappler researcher were convicted of “cyber libel” in what was widely seen as a naked attempt to curtail the free press.

In between Ressa’s two cases, the nation’s leading broadcaster, ABS-CBN, saw its franchise renewal application rejected after the network had come under fire from President Rodrigo Duterte for critical coverage of his deadly war on drugs. The Philippines also passed a controversial anti-terror law, which human rights watchdogs have said is designed to target dissenting voices.

The 1987 Philippine Constitution, ratified after the downfall of dictator Ferdinand Marcos, explicitly protects the freedom of the press. Despite persistent dangers to journalists, the Philippines has long been seen as home to one of Asia’s freest media environments.

But the Duterte administration has utilized tactics to stifle critical reporting not seen since the heyday of Marcos-era martial law  and it is laying a foundation to ensure it keeps the country’s media under its control.

Ressa, who was named a Time Magazine Person of the Year in 2018, has been the administration’s most prominent target. The Duterte administration initially attempted to close Rappler over allegations of unconstitutional foreign ownership; Duterte falsely said in his 2017 State of the Nation Address that Rappler was “fully owned” by Americans. “Not only is Rappler’s news fake, it being Filipino is also fake,” Duterte later said.

There are still foreign ownership cases pending against Rappler and Ressa, and the tax evasion case is based on accusations that Rappler falsified tax returns to hide foreign investment in the company. The case is just the latest in a series of government lawsuits targeting Rappler under Duterte, who has been critical of the website’s reporting on his public statements, his drug war, and his foreign policy.

“These charges are politically motivated, it is meant to harass and intimidate, it is meant to be a war of attrition to try to make us afraid to keep reporting,” Ressa told reporters after pleading not guilty. “The best response to it is to keep reporting.”

That may prove to be easier said than done, however. The government’s recent moves have led to looming job cuts at ABS-CBN after its broadcast and radio operations were shut down following a decision by Congress to reject its franchise renewal application in early July. And the precedent set by the Rappler cases, along with the anti-terror law’s provisions targeting dissenting voices, are causing fear among Filipino journalists unwilling to risk long, expensive legal battles and potential prison sentences.

ABS-CBN was officially shut down on July 10 by a House of Representatives committee made up of Duterte allies. It had gone off the air in May after the expiration of its previous 25-year franchise – the first time it went off-air since September 1972, when Marcos declared martial law.

Although Duterte’s spokesperson tried to distance the president from the decision, Duterte had vocally criticized ABS-CBN in the past and said last year that he would ensure its franchise renewal application was rejected.

The network, which has been forced into focusing exclusively on digital content (its website is still allowed to operate), announced job cuts that will take effect on August 31. Although ABS-CBN did not disclose how many employees will be laid off, the impact is expected to be significant at the network, which employs around 11,000 people.

The strikes against Rappler and ABS-CBN, on their own, cast a dark pall over the future of Philippine media. But there may be more to come, especially after the implementation of a new anti-terror law that allows a Duterte-appointed anti-terrorism council to identify and detain terrorists using a definition so broad, one group of lawyers argued it could include the U2 lead singer Bono.

Rather than on famous musicians, however, the law’s impact will likely be first felt in rural areas outside of Manila, where local activist organizations fight for land, environmental, and indigenous rights and rely on community journalists to relay their message to Manila and beyond. These journalists often work for little or no money and risk offending local power brokers with their reporting, leaving them vulnerable to lawsuits, detention, or extrajudicial killings.

These regions have become the first frontier for the administration’s ambitious infrastructure projects, many of which are financed by China, and on-the-ground reporters in more remote areas are increasingly essential to the Philippine media ecosystem.

The risks faced by these reporters are growing, and although Ressa said the best response to attacks on press freedom is to “keep reporting,” the worsening climate could leave community journalists with no choice but to stop.