12:43 pm | Friday, November 30th, 2012
SAN FRANCISCO —
President Benigno Aquino III has said he supports the Freedom of Information
bill, which just took a small step forward this week with the approval of the
House committee on public information.
But it’s clear that
Aquino also has reservations about the FOI bill, and these concerns appear to
be based on a misconception: He thinks Freedom of Information is all about
media.
This was evident in
some of his remarks focused on how FOI could help journalists.
In a speech last
year, he said, “This right to know carries with it responsibilities – to use
the information available in context; to present facts fairly; and to be
conscious of some elements who may want to use the information not to inform
the public, but to, rather, inflame them, ”
Giving media more
access to information, he continued, “does not mean that we want media to be lapdogs
of government; at the same time, media shouldn’t allow themselves to be used as
attack dogs either.”
More recently, Aquino
even endorsed the controversial “right of reply” provision, which could essentially
serve to intimidate and hamper media and give people in power even more power
to suppress critics.
As he told the
Philippine Daily Inquirer, “If two sides of a story are reported, if the
details of every news are accurate and the freedom of all Filipinos to form
their own opinion is valued, then any journalist has nothing to worry about,
isn’t it?”
Many of my Philippine
media friends and colleagues will no doubt have a problem with that statement
since most them believe in covering not just two, but many sides of every
story.
It’s also hard to
argue with some of the issues the president has raised in connection with the
state of the Philippine media, including corruption and fairness. Many Filipino
journalists I know share those concerns.
But the more
important point is this: Freedom of Information is not just about journalists
and journalism.
It says so at the
beginning of the bill authored by Rep. Erin Tañada: “The State recognizes the
right of the people to information on matters of public concern.” It does not
say “the right of the media.”
Representative Tañada
reiterated this to me during his recent visit to California, saying that point
“is much misunderstood.”
The bill “is more of
a citizen’s right to freedom of information and not the media,” he told me in
an email shortly before flying back to Manila to make another attempt to save
the bill.
“The constitutional
provision on the Right to Information did not mention it as a media right but a
citizen’s right,” he added.
The Philippines must
define its own path on this issue.
But the country can
learn a lot from the American experience when it comes to Freedom of
Information. The US law, which was passed in 1966, is called the Freedom of
Information Act, or the FOIA.
It’s even become a
verb, ‘Foya.’
US journalists would
typically say, ‘I’m going to Foya that document,” or ‘We can Foya the emails,
letters and other communications on this subject.’ To be sure, the law has
helped many newspapers and other media organizations in reporting on
government.
But in fact, any
person, including US citizens, foreign nationals, organizations, universities,
businesses and state and local governments, can file a FOIA request.
The respected
National Security Archives has a comprehensive list of FOIA successes, involving
both media and non-media groups, on its website.
A few examples:
In April 2004, the
Natural Resources Defense Council, using internal documents obtained through
the FOIA, found out that while the Environmental Protection Agency had
concluded that some kinds of rat poison posed a risk to children, the rat
poison makers were given broad access to make changes in documents describing
the risks.
In December 2005, the
Migration Policy Institute of New York University Law School used data obtained
through a FOIA to show that thousands of people accused by the Dept. of
Homeland Security of being immigration violators were innocent.
In 2005, the
Associated Press used FOIA documents to show that many small businesses who received
government loans meant to help out those who were affected by the September 11
terrorist attacks didn’t need the help.
The AP studied
documents on how $5 billion in loans were designated, and found that some of
the money went to a South Dakota country radio station, a dog boutique in Utah
and some Dunkin’ Donuts and Subway franchises that didn’t even know they were
getting terrorism-recover related loans.
In a few cases,
individuals were able to use the Freedom of Information Act to uncover important
information.
In 2001, a historian
at the National Security Archive reported that U.S. intelligence officers
“deliberately skewed” evidence to make it appear that North Vietnamese ships
attacked US destroyers in the Gulf of Tonkin in 1964. False reporting on the
incident eventually led to the escalation of the Vietnam War.
In 2006, an
independent transportation consultant, curious about New York’s taxi accident
rates, found out, with the help of FOIA data, that passengers in New York taxis
are twice as likely to be hurt in accidents as passengers in private cars
because taxi riders usually don’t wear seat belts and can be injured by cab
partitions.
Another point needs
to be highlighted: Freedom of Information is not just about scandals and
exposing secrets of people in power. It can also be about helping government
and policy makers uncover problems.
That’s what happened
in 2005 when the Richmond Times-Dispatch, using FOIA documents to review
disciplinary reports, concluded that up to 75 percent of the cells in the
Richmond City jail may have broken locks.
The paper looked into
the problem after an escaped inmate killed another prisoner. As a result of the
report, authorities found out that there was indeed a problem. They hired a
locksmith to fix the broken locks.
A Freedom of
Information law will not magically fix all problems in government. But it can
help expand and strengthen Philippine democracy,
Yes, it can certainly
help journalists do their jobs. But it’s much more than that.
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