By Juan V. Sarmiento Jr
Philippine Daily Inquirer
(Editors’ Note: For 25 days, we will be telling stories about the Philippine Daily Inquirer to mark the paper’s 25th anniversary on Dec. 9, 2010. Some are little inside stories but impacting on how we cover unfolding events; some are mark-the-day stories that become talk-of-the-town types; others are turning-point stories that have changed the landscape of history; still others, big or small, seize the heart and never let go. But whatever, the Inquirer will tell you the story.)
I WAS PART of the “Inquirer 8â€â€”seven editors and the publisher—detained one afternoon in March 2007 in a Manila police station on a libel charge filed by the husband of then President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo.
Until then no group of Inquirer editors had been held by the police since the newspaper was born two months before the Marcos dictatorship fell.
Detained were Isagani Yambot, publisher; Jose Ma. Nolasco, managing editor; Abelardo Ulanday, associate editor; Rosario Garcellano, associate editor for readership; Jorge Aruta, opinion editor; Artemio Engracia Jr., news editor; Pergentino Bandayrel Jr., national editor; and myself, a senior desk editor—the core of the News Desk and Opinion section.
We were respondents in a P22-million libel suit (Criminal Case Nos. 07-251368 to 72) that Jose Miguel “Mike†Arroyo filed in 2006—among the many cases he lodged against a total of 45 journalists critical of his activities as “First Gentleman.â€
Smuggling
The libel arose from several columns written by Ramon Tulfo about the alleged smuggling activities of Vicky Toh, Mike Arroyo’s former accountant and secretary who had been romantically linked to him. Toh was among those linked to smuggling at a previous Senate hearing.
We took the suit in stride, accepting it as part of the territory. We had no inkling that we would wind up in the company of thieves, like cell phone snatchers, at a police station in Pandacan, Manila, on March 20.
Confident that this was just another of those suits that we had grown accustomed to, we boarded company vehicles at the Inquirer editorial office on Chino Roces Avenue in Makati shortly after lunch and went to Manila City Hall, where the Manila regional trial court was located, to post bail.
We did not proceed to the court but stayed on the second floor of a restaurant in a building across from City Hall on Arroceros Street, while waiting for instructions from our lawyer.
Piano
About an hour after engaging in small talk while pop music blared from a speaker of the air-conditioned room, we started “playing on the piano.†We pressed our fingers on a stamp pad soaked with ink and set our fingerprints on cash bond forms.
Bobby Cristuta of the Inquirer administration services handled bundles of peso bills for the bond—P50,000 for each respondent.
The cash bond did not keep us from jail. At about half past 3 p.m., we were told to move out of the restaurant. We did not go to the court. Instead, in a convoy, we went to Police Station 10 on the corner of San Luis and Jesus Streets, about 2 to 3 kilometers from City Hall.
Wet market
It turned out that the station, right above a talipapa (small wet market), would be our detention center.
Fortunato Pagdanganan, our lawyer, explained to us what was happening. After the libel case was raffled off, warrants of arrest were issued. “The process was railroaded,†he said.
Manila policemen led by a Chief Inspector Dacara had tried to serve the arrest warrant on us at the Inquirer editorial offices in Makati at 3:25 p.m., we would later learn from an Inquirer security guard.
Roll call
At about 4 p.m. the names of the respondents were called out one by one by a Pandacan station police officer seated at the service desk with a marble top.
By instinct, having covered various beats before I joined the news desk, I pulled out my notebook and ball pen and began taking notes.
“Technically, you placed yourself under the custody of the police. Based on the [arrest] warrant, I have to book you. You are detained,†Senior Insp. Mar Reyes, chief of the anticrime section, said in a room where we had been ushered into.
Petty thieves
Within spitting distance from where we stayed was a cell holding a woman slumped on the floor. Twelve men, including petty thieves, were behind bars in an adjoining cell.
It was a very warm day and we were perspiring a lot.
“I will issue a certification of detention. Without the certification, without the booking, you will not be released,†the burly Reyes said while sitting before a computer in the room measuring about 20 square meters that also served as a dining area for police personnel.
Two other respondents—editor in chief Letty Magsanoc and Tulfo—were not with us. Magsanoc called in sick. She and Tulfo paid the cash bond the next day.
Reyes said the “Inquirer 8†could not go out of the station until there was a release order.
By this time, the station was crawling with reporters, photographers from different media organizations and TV crews covering the gatekeepers of the Inquirer, who had become news. Allison W. Lopez, then our Metro reporter, was also covering the news.
Under pressure
A police officer said that the station commander, Efren M. Perez, was under pressure from higher-ups to transfer us to the Manila Police District (MPD) headquarters on UN Avenue.
“Huwag nang patagalin 'yan dyan. I-turnover na sa warrant section (Don’t let them stay there a bit longer. Turn them over to the warrant section),†the police officer said, reading the text message from his superior.
“My chief is getting afraid of the First Gentleman,†he told us in Filipino.
The police officer said the editors were about to be moved to the MPD headquarters, where Bayan Muna Rep. Satur Ocampo was detained. (It was the height of the midterm national election campaign and Ocampo’s arrest was apparently aimed at discrediting his party-list group.)
“I don’t want to bring you to MPD, honestly. But then …†Reyes said, cutting short his statement.
The arrival of a release order issued by Judge Virgilio Alameda of Manila RTC Branch 10 stopped our transfer to the MPD, where supporters of Ocampo had been staging protest rallies.
The order reached the station at 4:44 p.m. At 4:48 p.m. there was a roll call again.
Mug shots
Yambot, our publisher, was made to stand against a wall and a cell phone was used for his mug shots. (Libel is still a criminal offense in the country.) We had our mug shots taken in the office a day or two before.
“Next time let’s meet in a better place,†a more pleasant Reyes said.
We were made to sign forms for our temporary liberty as well as the police blotter at the service desk below a framed photo of President Arroyo.
At 5:06 p.m. we were officially set free, ending our one-hour detention.
Clenched fist, pen
Annoyed by our detention, I walked down the stairs and found myself before a line of photojournalists. I raised my right hand holding a ball pen, and lifted to my chest with my left hand my precious notebook and a copy of the order of release Judge Almeda had issued to the station commander.
On the vehicle on our way back to the office, some of us agreed that we would no longer use “First Gentleman†when referring to the President’s husband because he was not one.
The lawsuit betrayed the ignorance of Mike Arroyo’s lawyer and his client on how the Inquirer News Desk operates. Except for the publisher, who has the last look at what columnists write (and the editor in chief and the managing editor, who supervise the Metro section where Tulfo’s columns appeared), I and the other editors on the staff box don’t go over what Tulfo writes.
As many as possible
Perhaps, the point of Mike Arroyo and his lawyer was to include in the suit as many editors as possible. (Not included in the suit, though, was Nilo Paurom, then chief of the news day desk and then Metro editor Ester Dipasupil. Paurom said Mr. Arroyo’s lawyer was his wife’s classmate in high school.)
We were on the evening TV news that day. The next day the Inquirer carried the front-page story, “Inquirer publisher, 7 editors detained after posting bail.†Beside the story was my photo with a raised fist holding a (ball) pen, a fitting symbol of the press ready to do battle with those wielding the sword on matters of public interest.
Five months after our brief detention, the Manila Regional Trial Court “dismissed permanently†the libel case against us.
After surviving an open heart surgery to repair a tear in his aorta, Mike Arroyo announced in May that he would drop all the 17 libel cases he had filed against journalists.
Despite the peace offering, a number of journalists pursued the class suit they had filed against the President’s husband, saying as a public figure, he was fair game and the subject of fair comment.
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