EYE ON ETHICS

Prof. Haque teaches Agril.Extension, Apllied & Agricultural Journalism at Shere-e-Bangla Agricultural University, Dhaka, Bangladesh.

Government-sponsored ethics. Ethics is a matter of voluntary compliance, but some governments have issued their own codes of ethics, or demand that journalists comply with their concept of ethical journalism. The following piece, adapted from Bangladesh’s The New Nation on Feb. 21, 2008, assumes that that country’s government is well within its rights to expect compliance with its views on ethical journalism. Your views and comments would be welcome.

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Recently I read an apology from the editor of a reputable English daily for publishing an article in that newspaper which was malicious, sweeping, and full of innuendos and few facts.

I was glad to see the editor’s goodwill and courage to admit a mistake and to express his regret for it. He mentioned three reasons why he apologized. While stating his third purpose, he raised a core ethical question–whether a columnist has the right to malign individuals, families or groups without any proof.

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In the two months since they arrested over 30 journalists covering a protest by a former Navy lieutenant who is now a Philippine senator and a group of soldiers under trial for mutiny, Philippine security forces and other officials did not stop threatening the press.

The Secretary of Interior declared a week after the incident that journalists would still be arrested when covering similar events. The Philippine National Police (PNP) said it would use force to remove journalists who refuse to obey police orders.
Last January 15, however, PNP Director General Avelino Razon went further. He said the police had evidence that one of the soldiers involved, Marine Capt. Nicanor Faeldon, escaped the police raid with the help of one of the reporters covering the incident.

Although Razon did not identify the reporter, he said she was female. The Philippine press followed up the leads and reported that Razon was refering to Dana Batnag, a reporter for the Japanese wire service Jiji Press.

Razon insinuated in his public statements that Faeldon was romantically involved with the female journalist who allegedly helped him escape. The basis for Razon’s accusations was video footage from a government-managed station which showed Batnag interviewing Faeldon. The police did not explain how the footage proved that Batnag had helped Faeldon escape.

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Should journalists heed authorities’ request to leave the scene of an unfolding news event, or should they stay? Which should take precedence for journalists, the presumably lawful orders of the authorities, or the public’s right to information? These are among the questions now being debated among journalists and journalists’ groups in the Philippines in the wake of a November 29 incident in which dozens of journalists were arrested for ignoring police requests to leave the scene.

The incident

The usually busy lanes of a street leading to the Manila Peninsula Hotel in the central business district of Makati were suddenly empty at around noon of November 29, save for Philippine senator and former Navy officer Antonio Trillanes, several civilians including former vice president Teofisto Guingona , and a number of soldiers carrying long firearms. The group was marching towards the Hotel. They were accompanied by an equally large group of journalists.

The group had walked out of a courtroom in Makati City, metro Manila, where Trillanes and some of the soldiers with him were under trial for an alleged mutiny in 2003.

After a two-kilometer walk, the group entered the five-star Manila Peninsula Hotel, where Trillanes and companions arranged for a press conference. From an original group of about a dozen that had been covering the trial, the number of journalists swelled as different news organizations smelled a developing story and sent reporters to the hotel to monitor events there.

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Mr. Bayuni is chief editor of The Jakarta Post.

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Covering a war or conflict is never easy. Because of lack of access to the front lines, journalists will be the first to admit the lack of objectivity in their coverage, unless they can tell the story from both sides of the trenches.

Lack of objectivity is thus a perennial ethical issue, but is probably the least of the problems of journalists covering conflict. As the war drags on, the media have a tendency to start oversimplifying the conflict, reducing it to a simple black and white issue. And yet neither a war nor a conflict is ever simple, and therefore the solution is likely to be far more complex than what the media would have us believe.

Thanks to Peace Journalism, which emphasizes the ethical imperatives of neutrality and keeping the welfare of those most affected in mind, journalists can do a much better job in covering conflicts, and even help speed up their end and even the search for lasting solutions. Peace Journalism, in contrast to traditional “War Journalism”, requires journalists to undertake conflict analysis, understand the origins of the conflict, and help find ways of ending it. This in furtherance of the need to focus on the welfare of those most affected by the conflict.

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Mr. Macale is assistant editor of the Philippine Journalism Review Reports.

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Media’s classic dilemma: how to balance the need to serve as the public watchdog by providing accurate, honest, complete, and crucial information, and the need to rely on advertisements to earn profits amid high production costs and dwindling circulation revenues.

What happens when the clear line between news and advertising begins to blur? –when news begins to sound like advertisements or commercial endorsements? Would readers, listeners, and viewers know the difference?

Take a Nov. 6 story of The Philippine Star about the opening of a new facility inside a shopping mall. The feature article, which appeared in the paper’s front page, was an enumeration of the amenities offered in the new facility—a convention center.

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