Editorial of the Bohol Chronicle dated October 12, 2008LET THE PUBLIC JUDGE: IS OUR MEDIA FAIR?The primary role of Media is to report and inform the public.
An informed citizenry is a vigilant citizenry. An informed community does less guesswork and therefore makes decision more wisely.
The Bohol Chronicle (54 years) and Station DYRD (47 years) know that all too well.
We are not in the business of inventing facts and fabricating stories. Much less twist facts as the City Mayor Dan Lim accuses the Chronicle and Station DYRD of doing.
Let's delve on the controversial drainage issue which has obviously gotten the goat of the City Mayor. We have a check list below of stories we carried on the issue. Please check whether FACT OR FICTION:
(1) There are 38 commercial establishments and households that illegally connected their waste disposal mechanism to the drainage system along CPG Avenue. It is illegal because the National Building Code prohibits such connections.
(2) Because there is no waste water treatment along San Jose and therefore no outfall, some streets of the cities get flooded with waste and water in rainy days. The public has been complaining.
(3) Senior Undersecretary Manuel Bunoan of the DPWH said City Hall promised to erect the waste water treatment facility simultaneous to the drainage, without which DPWH would not have proceeded with project. City Hall has not built the waste water treatment until today.
(4) The DPWH and the DENR, agencies of the country, assigned to put up infrastructure and protect the environment respectively, said the connections are illegal and the City Hall has the power to cut the 38 illegal connectors.
(5) Earlier in 2007, the Sangguniang Panlungsod declared these 38 connections as illegal and in that Resolution empowered the Office of the City Mayor to mandate the implementing rules. Nothing was done.
(6) Mayor Lim in his recent Mayor's Report and the recorded minutes of the coordination meeting at the Governor's Office agreed to implement the cutting after 30 days of voluntary compliance allowance for the violators.
(7) Two weeks later, the Mayor flip-flops and changes his mind that he will only do so if sewage network is turned over to the city. DPWH says there is nothing to turn over to the City because drainage is part of the national highway under the jurisdiction of the DPWH.
( 8 ) 22 months after the discovery of such illegal connections, nothing has been done. We are now on the 14th day of the 30 days deadline, the Mayor reneges on his promise to cut.
The Chronicle-DYRD reported the above facts and figures. No dagdag-bawas. Fact or fiction?
Mayor Lim accuses our media institution of twisting the facts. True or false?
Ladies and gentlemen of the City Jury called Public Opinion: You be the judge.
ROLE-PLAYING IN A CIVILIZED SOCIETYIn civilized societies, Public Office and Media Institutions should be bastions of public trust.
When they serve private more than public interest, society reacts. Public officials are voted out of office or impeached. Media papers are not bought by people and radio/TV stations not listened to.
Media is the natural watchdog, the lighthouse that tries to ensure that the public gets a kind of governance that is effective, transparent and equitable. Many times it criticizes official acts - or non-action, while it also appreciates accomplishments.
It is now a common and public knowledge that the City Mayor becomes uncomfortable whenever the public has criticisms on certain issues. As a result, he abandoned his weekly radio program over Station DYRD starting yesterday, a program which we offered for whoever is the Mayor during the past 13 years.
In his letter to the General Manager of the radio station yesterday, he said "you have made it clear that you have no control over the constant and unfair criticisms being hurled against me." This is something the mayor should know. In this twin media institution, we do "not control" criticisms against public officials (as long as the issues are legitimate like such major issue as a drainage problem).
We were surprised to see how sensitive the City Chief Executive is to public criticism that his office even allegedly pressured the advertisers to pull out of DYRD's "Pulso," a radio program anchored by a perceived critic Kagawad Batchoy Alba while he repeatedly said in public his dislikes and personal attacks against broadcaster Atoy Cosap, who anchors a DYRD primetime news program. The Mayor even mounted a head-on competition to Cosap's program at 6 to 7 a.m. and reports have it that he is planning to put up another program to compete with Alba.
His latest attacks, however, have been torpedoed not just on the two broadcasters but now against the Chronicle and Station DYRD - as institutions. As if there is an orchestrated organization-wide plot to discredit him personally. The reason is obvious because we print and air public issues which are unsavory for him.
We say: Mayor Lim, no one is perfect, thus, the public expects every politician to be open to accept some lapses in the course of rendering public service, we, in the Media holds the role - assigned by most civilized societies to be observers and watchdog of public conduct. If the City Mayor wants our role, then he can leave his post as Mayor and join us in the Fourth Estate.
But we in Media prefer to stay where we are. We normally do not have the stomach for politics.
And yet, the Mayor in one of the radio shows, wanted to politicize the issue. Says the Honorable Mayor: if I win reelection in 2010, then they (referring to us) lose; if I lose, then they win.
If Mayor Lim wins again in 2010 - fair and square, then it's his opponent who loses, not us. If he loses - fair and square as well, people voted him out of office for good reasons.
In our case, if people stop patronizing our newspaper and radio stations, then, we may have a cause to worry.
But not before that. In the meantime, some of us may have to decide at some point in our lives to either be public officials or media men. Think about that.
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