First there was Rey Blanco. Then Percy Lapid. Now it is Cresenciano Bunduquin. One year into this administration, three broadcasters have been reported killed. This culture of impunity amplified by the past administration has drawn fear among media men merely doing what they are supposed to. Yet, time and again, from the way these three dared and the way the press holds its ground, we have seen that no leader, state or power can ever shut the media down. 

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Blanco, Lapid, and Bunduquin were all radio commentators critical of their stances. 

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All while a crackdown on human rights defenders and journalists haunts the state, the Presidential Communications Office (PCO) launched a free newspaper to inform the public of the President’s projects. An adherence to Executive Order No. 16, the PCO’s project is said to “engage and involve the citizenry in public discourse”. I never knew public discourse ever meant propaganda. 

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To inform is not the media’s sole purpose. What the public sees and reads is our responsibility because the people’s collective consciousness lies in how we make them see reality. It is in every news angle, every word choice, and every news package. When you have a newspaper that only prints state projects, policies, and programs but never reports the disappearances of activists, oppression of indigenous peoples, and killings, you do not have a functioning paper, you have a mouthpiece. 

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True media exposes truth no matter how uncomfortable—because the people need to know. Unfortunately, to have an informed citizenry is not what the state is after. An informed people will resist when faced with injustice after all. So, how do you keep a revolution at bay? Feed them good news. Make sure they only know so much. 

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This is how the state controls the media, albeit against their will. One, you produce selective content highlighting the government’s ‘achievements’. Two, you compile all defiant media outfits in one list, labeled as terrorists. Three, you weaponize the law. The law, as we know it, is the law only to the common tao. 

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Other than the what’s, the people also deserve to know the why’s and how’s behind a story. When stories about infrastructure projects parade the news, will The Gazette say if there were families displaced for ‘development’? As it headlines NTF-ELCAC-caught activists, will they discuss underlying issues on why some decide to take up arms? These are questions any critical media knows about.            
 
A muted world–where the only voice will be that of the powerful–is what we would be if all media succumbed to state repression, whose only purpose is to tame all outfits and produce a clawless press. If the father was able to stage a one-man press in the ’70s, today’s ruthless media will not let the son repeat that damning history. 

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— Rachel Ivy Reyes