ENQUIRY
DEMAREE J.B. RAVAL
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The perils of the pen
Sunday, 03 01, 2009
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Notwithstanding the controversy over the “Alabang Boys,” which put the reputation of a passel of prosecutors under a nasty cloud, Justice Secretary Raul Gonzalez can rest easy with the thought that a great many of his prosecutors are decent.
We single out in this column, for being decent, the following: Second Assistant City Prosecutor Hannibal Santillan, First Assistant City Prosecutor Romulo Nanola, and City Prosecutor Feliciano Aspi, all of the Office of the City Prosecutor of Makati City.
Santillan resolved to dismiss, upon a preliminary investigation, a criminal complaint for Robbery in Band against Amado Macasaet of Malaya, Federico Pascual of Philippine Star, Victor Agustin of Manila Standard Today, and this writer. Nanola recommended approval of the resolution of Santillan, and Aspi approved the resolution.
In one stroke — no, make that three — the four writers, who were simply doing their journalistic duty to expose wrongdoings in a corporation partly owned by the government, can finally tell their accuser straight to his face: “Nice try; now get that shyster out of your stable of lawyers.” (A bootleg copy of Webster’s in CM Recto defines shyster as a lawyer locked in with his proverbial bag of dishonest tricks, looking forever to cash in on his clients’ ignorance.)
The accuser of Macasaet, et al. had included them as participants in a break-in (by a band of robbers labeled in a privilege speech by Senate President Juan Ponce Enrile as “Ali Baba and the 40 Thieves”) into the offices of Philcomsat Holdings Corp., where vital documents, proving the multi-million plunder of PHC, were “liberated.”
The trouble with the accuser is that he failed to get get his facts straight, and relied too much on his shyster. He placed Macasaet, et al. right there at the scene of the crime, when the truth is not one of them was even within shouting distance from Gil Puyat Avenue where the PHC office was. In fact, one of them was in Kabul, Afghanistan, at the time the alleged robbery took place, suffering from a severe attack of homesickness.
What their accusers did not know was that Macasaet, et al. had simply gotten hold of copies of the documents exposed by Enrile at the Senate during a privilege speech. Through Enrile, the bank accounts and recipients of the filched monies were identified; the so-called PR money coursed through a fictitious Veronica Nepomuceno was made public; the shyster’s gargantuan fees were disclosed; the modus operandi for the plunder was detailed, and many more nasty doings.
The sworn duty of Macasaet, et al. to “tell it as it is” impelled them to write in their respective columns the sordid details of the methodology of the plunder of PHC.
Rightly so, Santillan concluded that the accuser of Macasaet, et al. “miserably failed to show any proof or assertion that they directly participated in the alleged physical taking of the personal belongings averred by the complainant, and this should cause the outright dismissal of the robbery charge against them.”
All’s well that ends well, indeed, but the filing of this baseless charge against Macasaet, et al. is symptomatic of the peril that the writer who tells the truth has to face. The writer writes the truth about a particular incident, or about a particular issue. The subject of the truthful writing, enraged by the bad publicity generated by such writing, goes to his lawyer for advice. The lawyer, especially if he is the shyster type and thinks of nothing but his fees, will advise the poor sap to go ahead with the filing of the criminal complaint, however, baseless.
Between and among them, Macasaet, et al. probably are facing a host of libel and journalism-related criminal cases. They are unperturbed, although the peril of being haled to the prosecutor’s office or, eventually, to a court of law is always there.
The peril is not so much being accused falsely, but the effects of being accused unfairly. The journalist will have to engage a lawyer, for a hefty fee most of the time; the journalist will have to appear for several hearings, leaving him no time enough to research, think and write well enough. And because of the opprobrium associated with a criminal case, a journalist who faces so many criminal suits, however, innocent and unfairly accused he is, loses some of his readers; a journalist also loses his friends who are friends of people about whom he has written the painful truth; etcetera. Plainly and simply, a charge against the writer who does not deserve it, is a vexation to the spirit.
Once in a little while, a journalist invariably treads on the toes of one who is undeniably corrupt — with too much tainted money, or power and influence to use to get back on that writer. Therein lies the peril: With truth as his only defense, the writer will have to contend with the money and power in the hands of the corrupt. He will just have to rely (read that as “have faith”) in the common decency of the investigating prosecutors — as what Santillan, Nanola and Aspi have exhibited. But what if by bad luck the writer’s case is lodged with a prosecutor with an uncommon reputation that makes Secretary Gonzalez utter unprintable invectives in the privacy of his office?
Writing, particularly journalism, is a profession where those who write truthfully and without malice must thrive without fear. The risk of their being slapped with a criminal charge is there alright, all the time. But despite that risk — and that ominous Right of Reply Bill in Congress — writing is still a beautiful, brave and ennobling calling.
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