As Mindanao reels yet again on the brink of another all-out war,
sections of mainstream print media may be helping push it closer to the
edge.

A quick round-up of their coverage tells us what in their view has been
happening: A rogue commander not supported by the rest of the Moro
National Liberation Front (MNLF) and who is coddling “al-Qaeda linked”
Abu Sayyaf and Jemaah Islamiyah members started it all by attacking the
military. The military had no choice but to retaliate. Now things are
spiraling out of control and it’s all the terrorist-coddling rogue
commander’s fault.

Such a plot may well have been written by the public information office
of the Armed Forces of the Philippines (AFP). But it is precisely how
the conflict is being passed off as truth to the public by certain
sections of the press. The underlying message is hard to miss: the
military are necessarily the “good guys” and they need our unconditional
support.

Take for example veteran defense reporter Manny Mogato’s dispatch for
Reuters on April 17: "Fighting between government forces and rogue
Muslim rebels is spreading in the southern Philippines, shattering hopes
for peace and threatening local support for a U.S.-backed campaign to
flush out militants."[1]

Note that the word “rogue” - a value-laden adjective synonymous to
“rascal” or “scoundrel” according to a thesaurus - was not enclosed in
quotation marks. Editors, usually allergic to the faintest hints of
editorializing, apparently let it pass. The word “alleged,” a convenient
term for attributing a claim to a source, is missing. There is also no
indication that the reporter was merely using a word used by the
military to describe their adversaries. The writer himself apparently
believes - and leads his readers to believe - that the other actors in
the conflict are indeed “rogue.” In another paragraph, Mogato describes
the leader of the “rogue” rebels, Ustadz Habier Malik, as a “renegade”
commander - again, without using quotation marks. The term “renegade” is
likewise used without quotation marks by Anthony Vargas of the Manila
Times and ABS-CBN’s online news.

Reporting for the Philippine Daily Inquirer, Michael Lim Ubac, Christine
Avendano, and Julie Alipala wrote: "President Macapagal-Arroyo...
yesterday gave free rein to the Armed Forces of the Philippines to
pursue Moro terrorists on Jolo island...“[2] Note that the word”terrorist," a highly emotionally charged term, does not have quotation
marks around it and there is nothing to suggest that the reporters were
merely using Arroyo’s word. It was their own. The headline, "GMA tells
AFP: Pursue MNLF rebel," proclaims who they are referring to. They also
describe Malik as a commander of a “rogue faction” of the MNLF but
without indicating that such a description was bestowed by the
government, not something that they found out on their own. If such
glaring editorializing was an oversight, there was no erratum the
following day.

Alipala, in another Inquirer article published April 25, wrote:
"Military clashes against Abu Sayyaf terrorists and their coddlers have
triggered fresh evacuation of residents in nine towns on the island.“Having reported that the AFP has been running after the MNLF’s”rogue
faction" because it is accused by the military of coddling the Abu
Sayyaf, Alipala and her editors seem to have gone one step farther. They
explicitly accept the military’s avowed rationale for the war and inform
their readers that yes, indeed, without any doubt, the MNLF has been
coddling the Abu Sayyaf and that this is truly the reason why the
military is hunting them.

In this case, Alipala outdid even the AFP itself because as late as
April 21, AFP Chief Hermogenes Esperon himself was quoted by the
Inquirer as saying that they are still “validating” reports about the
MNLF linking up with the Abu Sayyaf.[3] If Alipala had other sources of
information to support her contention, she did not disclose them.
The above is, with few exceptions, typical: reporters have taken to
appropriating the military’s explanation in their narrative and to
adopting the military’s labels and adjectives as their own.[4]
Journalists normally attribute claims to their sources and take pains to
put quotation marks around their sentences or phrases. For example,
instead of saying, "fighting between government forces and rogue Muslim
rebels,“one could have, at the very least, said”fighting between
government forces and Muslim rebels described as ’rogue’ by the
military.“Or”Moro fighters described as ’terrorists’ by the
government“instead of”Moro terrorists." (To be fair, one must also
ensure that the Moro fighters’ own description of the military should
also be included.)

But choices are rarely innocent: that attribution has been deemed
unnecessary points to just how much the world-views of the military and
the reporters covering them have melded.

Another basic journalistic practice, that of allowing the other party to
air its side, was, in all of the articles above, casually abandoned. No
one bothered to find out what Malik or anyone who could speak for his
group had to say. It was no secret, even then, that the MNLF and other
independent sources from Sulu had, from the very beginning, maintained
that it was the military’s attack on an MNLF camp the previous week, the
killing of a Moro youth and other unresolved abuses they blame on the
military, and the postponement of the tripartite meeting seven times in
a row that, they claim, provoked them to fire back.

There is also no mention that the MNLF has consistently denied
allegations that they are sheltering the Abu Sayyaf nor is there any
reference to the military’s failure to present proof to support its
allegation. There is not even a passing mention of the MNLF’s claim
that, contrary to the AFP’s pronouncements, Malik has not been disowned
by the group.

There was no mention of all these because those with the MNLF were not
even asked. Article after article on the situation lacked the customary
“other side”. If it was because Malik or anyone who could speak for him
couldn’t be found - an unlikely possibility - there was no mention that
"Malik or any other representative from his group could not be reached
as of press time." Interestingly, there was a reference to MNLF
chairman Nur Misuari supposedly distancing himself from Malik in an
ABS-CBN article. But who was the source? Not Misuari himself but a
police superintendent. The other side does have a voice; the media
allows the military and the police to speak for them.[5]

This is not to say that the MNLF should be given the final word. Beyond
presenting both sides, the media is also expected to verify their claims
independently because two contradictory sides can’t both be true at the
same time. But how can the MNLF’s claims even be scrutinized when they
are not even given the chance to air their side? That reporters ignored
the need for balance, an elementary requirement of any news article, not
only betrays complete faith in one side’s pronouncements and a lack of
any interest in finding out the truth.

Such faith is confounding given the military’s record of contradiction.
That the military has in the past claimed to be pursuing “terrorists”
only to backtrack later is documented. In February 2003, for instance,
the military adamantly claimed that the target of their offensives was
the Pentagon gang in central Mindanao only to publicly admit later that
they were actually going after the Moro Islamic Liberation Front (MILF)
all along.[6] As early as 2001, National Security Adviser Norberto
Gonzales had accused the MNLF of getting cozy with the Abu Sayyaf.[7]
But up to November last year, when the AFP again claimed to be fighting
the MNLF because it was coddling the ASG, Esperon contradicted his own
superiors and subordinates by saying that they had no confirmation to
back-up their allegation.[8]

When clashes broke out in the past, the military had repeatedly
presented itself as the aggrieved party that was only provoked to fire
back in response. Such was the case in February and November 2005. It
turned out that, according to locals, the former began when a group of
soldiers massacred an entire defenseless family in Kapuk Punggul and the
latter started when the military knowingly attacked an MNLF camp.
A more systematic and more comprehensive content-analysis of media’s
reportage could yield interesting findings. But its coverage of recent
developments in Mindanao’s long-drawn out war is most likely not an
aberration. This is not the first time, for example, that the media had
adopted the military’s labels. When fighting broke out in November 2005,
article after article reported that the military was going after a
so-called “Misuari Breakaway Group” - the name the military gave their
enemies at that time - even when those who were being chased claimed to
be with the mainstream of the MNLF and even as no other faction within
the MNLF contested their claim.[9] Question: if Juan wants to call
himself Juan but Jose wants to call him Pedro, should the media follow
Jose and call Juan not Juan but Pedro instead?

The media’s coverage of the barbaric beheading of seven construction
workers also raises a lot of issues. The Inquirer devoted its front-page
banner article discussing the heart-breaking killing of innocent
civilians with simple dreams and on how Muslim leaders roundly condemned
the crime.[10] Rightly so. But when was the last time the Inquirer - or
any newspaper for that matter - devoted a banner article, or even one on
the inside pages, on the beheading of innocent Moro youths blamed on the
military? When was the last time reporters solicited the Catholic
hierarchy’s condemnation of Catholics who are accused of beheading
Moros? Or are young Moros’ dreams worth less in the calculus of
newspaper lay-out? Is their religion irrelevant when the killers are
Christian?

Interestingly, with the Abu Sayyaf probably mentioned in more news
reports these days than any other group or individual, when was the last
time a reporter bothered to interview someone from the group? Given
that, in Sulu, the Abu Sayyaf seems to be whoever the military claims it
to be and given that those who are labeled Abu Sayyaf, being buried six
feet under, could no longer contest the military’s claims, did the media
have any other independent source of information on the beheadings apart
from the military? With all the speculation and the unresolved reports
that the Abu Sayyaf is colluding with the military and local warlords,
isn’t it high time that someone in the media actually tried to find out
who they are and what they have to say and why they do the things they
reportedly do? Or shouldn’t we talk to the “enemies” and just allow the
military to be their spokespersons?

Speaking of the Abu Sayyaf, no mention of the group now seems to be
complete without the phrase “Al-Qaeda linked.” News report after news
report point out that the Abu Sayyaf is linked to Osama bin Laden’s
worldwide network and leave it at that - as though such a claim has
once-and-for-all been established and is not to be questioned any
longer.[11] Except for the occasional reference to unnamed "intelligence
officials," there is often no mention as to who makes the claim and no
discussion as to the bases of their claims.

We are never told that such a claim - which is central to the rationale
for the “war on terror” - is hardly undisputed. In fact, even the Arroyo
government is on record as saying that such a connection has not been
adequately proven and the US Congressional Research Service has pointed
out that the government’s claims are conflicting.[12] Other researchers
have raised a lot of unanswered questions over the allegation. If they
are unable to go to the bottom of things, then, at the very least,
reporters could add a cautionary line or two saying that the
’al-Qaeda-linked’ claim is still the subject of an ongoing debate. Such
a disclaimer is rarely found. The phrase “al-Qaeda-linked” has become a
permanent, self-perpetuating fixture that is questioned by no one and
repeated by everyone.

What explains reporters’ cavalier abandonment of the basic tenets of
journalism in covering the war? The pressures of the news-cycle? The
perils of parachute journalism? What makes among the most skeptical of
professions suddenly accept what they are told without any question? Is
there an underlying “us versus them” jingoism and prejudice underlying
the coverage? Is there a confluence of interests between the military
and the reporters “embedded” with them? These issues could be exciting
academic questions in the field of media studies.

But it is an academic question only if lives were not on the line. For
just as the media played a large part in justifying and rallying public
opinion in favor of the invasion of Iraq by their failure - or refusal -
to look into Bush’s claim regarding Iraq’s non-existent weapons of mass
destruction - and indeed the New York Times later apologized for this
failure, the Philippine media’s coverage of developments in the South
has been fanning the flames of war.

The unchallenged story-line that the military is purveying and the media
is uncritically reporting to the public - i.e. that a “rogue” faction
“coddling terrorists” started it all and that the military are
necessarily the “good guys” who can do no wrong and who were left with
no other choice - is precisely what is required to draw public support
for aggressive military solutions to the complex problems in the south.
The other possibilities - that hawkish military commanders backed up by
other interests with the material incentives to kill the peace agreement
have taken over Arroyo’s embattled government, that Moros are being
driven to a corner because of the atrocities being committed against
them - will never be explored because they will not make it to the news.
It is not reporters who are dropping bombs in Sulu. But by uncritically
covering the war from the perspective of the military, they may be
cheering on those who do.#

Endnotes

[1] Manny Mogato, “Fighting Spreads in southern Philippines,” Reuters,
April 17, 2007

[2] Michael Lim Ubac, Christine O. Avendano, and Julie S. Alipala, "GMA
tells AFP: Pursue MNLF rebel," Philippine Daily Inquirer, April 18, 2007
[3] Juliet Labog-Javellana, “Beheadings Outrage GMA, Islamic Scholars,”
Philippine Daily Inquirer, April 21, 2007

[4] “Palace defends Sulu offensive vs Moro rebels,” abs-cbn.com, April
17, 2007; “Beheadings spur AFP to press hunt for Abu Sayyaf,” The Manila
Times, April 21, 2007; “Sulu fighting uproots more than 40,000: WFP,”
abs-cbn.com, April 19, 2007

[5] “Sulu fighting uproots more than 40,000: WFP,” abs-cbn.com, April
19, 2007

[6] Dona Pazzibugan, "MILF, not Pentagon gang, real target, says
military," PDI, Feb 17 03

[7] “I didn’t oust Nur, I was part of the process,” Newsbreak, December
5, 2001

[8] Roel Pareno, “2,000 Sulu folk flee fighting,” Philippine Star,
November 15, 2005

[9] See for example Dona Z. Pazzibugan, Julie S. Alipala, Edwin O.
Fernandez, Nash Maulana, “New fighting erupts in Jolo,” Inquirer News
Service, November 17, 2005, www.inq7.net, Sam Mediavilla, Al Jacinto and
Anthony Vargas, “Jolo offensive to drag on until Christmas,”
abs-cbn.com, November 18, 2005

[10] Julie S. Alipala and Cynthia D. Balana, "Dreams of 2 Zambo Teeners
end in Jolo," Philippine Daily Inquirer, April 21, 2007

[11] Julie S. Alipala, "9 soldiers, civilian slain in Army base shooting
rampage,“Philippine Daily Inquirer, April 8, 2007; Julie S. Alipala,”Military probes Sulu misencounter," Philippine Daily Inquirer, March 5,
2007; Andrew Marshall, “The Philippines’ Unending Guerilla War,” Time
Magazine,
http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1582112,00.html

[12] Larry Niksch, "Abu Sayyaf: Target of Philippine-US Anti-Terrorism
Cooperation," CRS Report for Congress, Jan 25, 2002