Global crisis for free expression
October 5th, 2002
DAKAR, Senegal—“A global crisis” is how participants in the Annual General Meeting of the International Freedom of Expression Exchange (IFEX) which concluded yesterday in this former French colony described the state of free expression.
The Canadian-based IFEX is a global network of free-expression and press-freedom advocacy groups. It monitors through its Action Alert Network the state of free expression all over the world and issues a weekly communiqué on urgent cases that need to be immediately addressed. The Philippines’ Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility is a member of IFEX and of its governing council.
Reporting on the state of free expression from Africa, Asia and Latin America, IFEX members painted a gloomy picture and outlook as a result of the events of September 11, 2001. Violations of the right to free expression, however, are taking place in the context of a worldwide offensive against human rights not only in those countries ruled by authoritarian governments, but also in those countries governed by supposedly democratic governments.
Among the latter is the Philippines, where, in the wake of the country’s fawning commitment to US strategic goals, attacks on political and social activists and critics of the government policy of re-engagement with US military interests have intensified since early this year, and where there has developed an atmosphere of suspicion and hysteria that’s being used to justify the steady erosion of the Bill of Rights.
The lifting of the “maximum tolerance” policy for demonstrations and the empowerment of the police to decide who may or may not get a permit to demonstrate, the filing of several draconian antiterrorism bills in both Houses of Congress, the identification with the “terrorist” Communist Party of the Philippines of legal groups and the implication that they are fair game for suppression are only a few of the signs of a shift in emphasis from relative tolerance of dissent and free expression to its suppression.
The Philippines, however, is only being true to form as just another poor country that takes its cue from the United States. The Philippine government should not think its cynical manipulation of the public’s fears as unique.
The shift from tolerance to suppression, or the intensification of suppression, is indeed happening worldwide, especially among US client states. Other countries like China and Russia are, on the other hand, also using the terrorist bogey as justification for the suppression of dissenting groups. Over the past 10 years it had been increasingly difficult to suppress the rights of dissenting groups and communities without inviting global condemnation. Today the rights of the same groups and communities, once they’re labeled terrorists, can be attacked with impunity.
The attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon, commemorated only a few days ago, and the US campaign against terror, have in short reversed a previous situation in which there had been a steady decline in attacks on press freedom and free expression. Although problem areas remained before September 11, 2001, the problems assumed crisis proportions after.
The governments that had been reluctantly loosening their grip on free expression (including the free press), as well as governments in democratic settings, saw in the antiterrorism campaign and the fear of terrorists an excuse to suppress free expression to keep themselves in power.
Encouraged by the United States’ own suppression of the rights of its own citizens at home, and confident that the United States will ignore the violation of the rights of those they label terrorists, these governments are using antiterrorism to suppress dissent and the independent media.
A September 11, 2002, declaration signed by some 50 members of the IFEX network present at the Dakar meeting thus urged that governments refrain from using “the threat of terrorism as an excuse to impose restrictions on freedom of expression or on the freedom of information.”
Although the signatories condemned all acts of terrorism and crimes against humanity “such as the attacks on the United States one year ago,” they nevertheless recalled that the media have “a fundamental role . . . in the public’s right to know, including issues related to terrorism.”
The antiterrorism laws passed in many countries, most of them patterned after the US Patriot Act of 2001, the participants noted, “include provisions that undermine civil liberties and, in some cases, severely limit the right to free expression and freedom of information.”
The participants might as well have been referring to the bills so far filed in the Philippine Congress, which are uncannily similar.
Not only do these bills authorize police searches of private homes, they also penalize the filing or dissemination of “wrongful information”—an accusation which could very well be lodged against journalists as well as “texters.” In addition, the Philippine bills will also allow police monitoring and interception of any form of communication whether through cell phone, the Internet or ordinary mail.
The declaration noted an “increasing tendency toward official censorship and undue pressure on journalists and the media by the authorities,” but also had something to say about how the media themselves must exert efforts to improve their performance:
“Ignorance, fear and uncertainty created by secrecy and unprofessionalism in media leads to manipulation of public feeling in favor of intolerance and acts of extremism rather than the resolution of conflict and democratic exchange.” Media organizations, journalists groups and professional associations, including media educators must “take measures to enhance the capacity for informed, professional and tolerant reporting on terrorism.”
Among the means the declaration suggests are “professional training on issues such as safety of journalists, and conflict reporting and tolerance in journalism,” as well as “providing opportunities for the discussion of ethical issues related to reporting on terrorism.”
Equally important, however, the declaration urged respect for freedom of expression and democracy by those governments engaged in combating terrorism. It urged respect for the rights of journalists to work in safe conditions, and affirmed the right of the media to report fully on terrorism—which means allowing journalists access to conflict areas.
The declaration was issued even as the United States appears determined to go to war in Iraq, despite overwhelming world opinion against an act that could very well plunge the entire world into war, creating in the process not only multiple areas of conflict and creating legions of victims.
The participants in the meeting seemed fully aware of what lies ahead, given US determination to ignore world opinion in the unilateral pursuit of its aim to secure its interests. (Of course none of the participants knew of the Arroyo government’s unabashed pandering to US arrogance when it pledged the unlimited use of Philippine air space for US aircraft. If they did they would have wondered aloud at how uniquely slavish it is.)
The war on terrorism as the US is waging it, one speaker pointed out, will be long, and will result not only in vast suffering in the poorest areas of the world, but will also have a devastating effect on free expression and human rights in general. For those who value human rights, press freedom and free expression, the new world the US is creating will require levels of near-unprecedented dedication.
Welcome to the new world order.
(ABS-CBNNEWS.COM/TODAY, September 13, 2002)