RP is inspiration for media cynics

The following is a blog written by Karl Malakunas, Agence France-Presse (AFP) bureau chief in Manila. This blog entry went out on Yahoo.uk and the AFP website.

Philippine inspiration for media cynics
by Karl Malakunas
Manila Bureau Chief
Agence France-Presse

For critics who love to hate the media, do not read any further.

For those who want only to read more about Tiger’s philandering, this blog isn’t for you either.

But if you want to believe there is more to modern media than celebrity worship and fast food news, then this is for you…

The Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism today won Agence France-Presse’s Kate Webb award, which is in honour of one of our finest correspondents who died of cancer in 2007.

The small band of journalists at the PCIJ has for 20 years shown incredible courage and ethics in trying to hold the Philippine elite to account.

In many countries, investigative reporting is nothing extraordinary.

But the Philippines is the most dangerous country in the world for journalists, ahead of Iraq and Afghanistan.

A total of 134 reporters have been murdered since the fall of dictator Ferdinand Marcos in 1986.

Many readers may remember the horrific events in the southern Philippines last month when a warlord family allegedly organised a massacre of 57 people, including 31 journalists.

While memories of that story will no doubt fade for many around the world, death threats and other forms of intimidation will continue to haunt the PCIJ every day.

Yet they are as humble as they are brave.

Malou Mangahas, the PCIJ’s executive director, said this year’s Kate Webb award should recognise all reporters who worked with courage in the Philippines, particularly the 31 murdered in Maguindanao province.

“It is very difficult, almost discomfiting, to say our situation as journalists from Metro Manila could even come close to the vulnerability of our colleagues in Maguindanao or in the provinces of the Philippines,” she said.

“So I think a fitting tribute is to accept it in their honour.”

If you have got this far into the blog, you may be thinking Mangahas and her colleagues belong to another era, Kate Webb’s era, where the media industry had more money to spend on investigative reporting.

But the PCIJ is showing committed journalism can adapt and survive in our era of shrinking budgets and instant gratification.

Its website (http://pcij.org/) is engaging, it is developing a daily blog and a video service is starting to deliver more of its content to media outlets.

And I believe the fundamentals of decent journalism remain the same, no matter which platform the content is delivered.

Or, as Mangahas said: “Good reporting is really investigative at the core”.