Inspirational Message of Secretary Ignacio R. Bunye Before members of PAPI

Manila Hotel (14 March 2007)
Good evening to the officers and members of PAPI.

It is my pleasure to be here tonight and witness the formal induction of your new board of officers. I am also privileged to join this testimonial dinner to our good friend, Atty. Nap Rama.

In the invitation that I received, I was requested to deliver an inspirational message.

I asked a veteran journalist what kind of message I should deliver to inspire hardworking, dedicated journalists such as the PAPI members. My friend said, either give them a good story or declare an open bar.

So here's my story.

I was once , like all of you, a journalist. And like you, I knew how it was to look for a story, write it up, and watch as my editor went through it with a red ink pen. Those were the days when carbon referred to paper, and the words "cut and paste" literally involved scissors and glue.

My days as a reporter were among the happiest and most challenging days of my life. It's not just the daily adventure of reporting the news. It was also the privilege of knowing that people get to know events as they happened through my eyes. It was a position of trust, and a classroom of life.

Flash forward to where I am today. Everyday, as press secretary and presidential spokesperson, I deal with reporters - local and international - who call me or ask me questions during briefings or while I accompany the President on foreign trips. Because of my personal background, I appreciate the job of today' s working journalists. And I do my best to give them what they need.

Unlike the old days, however, the news cycle is now 24/7, and the competition among media establishments is fiercer. When I became a reporter, we had only four major morning broadsheets, two afternoon dailies, two radio news stations and one major tv news station. Now I have a hard time keeping track of all the publications and broadcast media groups.

We in government have to deal with that and recognize that our role is to provide information not as a favor to any media company, but as a service and a duty to the Filipino people.

Our task is not always easy. For one, the fast pace of the news cycle requires that the government communications machinery be just as fast in responding to the headlines. It requires a bureaucracy that is nimble and light on its feet; and information officers that know how to fulfill their jobs well. It does not help that some public information officers are often intimidated by the media; not all know first hand how a newspaper works or what a broadcast reporter needs.

So I recommend to Johnny Dayang and the members of PAPI that your group develop a program on an interactive collaboration with our public information officers especially those without work backgrounds in the news media. Perhaps, Johnny, we can invite you and some of the people in this room to serve as our resource persons in our next forum with the PIOs. Let them know the human side of journalists; that you also make mistakes, that you also get tired of having to chase down a story only to meet a bureaucratic roadblock.

That is my first suggestion.

My second suggestion may be more controversial than the first. It has to do with the killings of journalists.

Let me state this clearly: Government is just as appalled, and as affected as the journalism community is, when a reporter, editor, news cameraman, photographer, radio commentator or any member of the media is killed violently, and senselessly.

We are appalled and affected because such loss diminishes the humanity of our society. We are appalled and affected because we do respect press freedom and value it as a hallmark of our democracy. We are appalled and affected because we share the grief of the families, and we want justice delivered to the victim and his or her loved ones.

From the beginning, the government has strongly condemned these killings. President Arroyo created the Melo Commission to get to the bottom of these political killings and deaths of journalists that have plagued the nation for many generations. The Melo Report, while admittedly incomplete, nonetheless represents a milestone in our quest for real and hard answers. For the first time in a generation, we have begun to lift the veil on the violence that has stalked our country for far too long.

Task Force Usig and Task Force Newsman are just as committed as the journalism community in ensuring that these crimes are solved. The Anti-Terror Law is another positive step towards bringing an end to groups bent on destroying our democratic institutions and processes.

Government is just as pained as you are when a journalist dies and we are committed to do what we can to make sure that these killings stop. That is our agenda. But there may be other groups out there that have a different agenda: to sow mayhem, to make government look bad in the eyes of the people, to dominate not with ideas, but by wielding violence.

Here then is my second suggestion: that you and I cooperate in preventing the killings of more journalists. That we learn to trust each other enough to know that when one of you is threatened, we are there to offer protection. Cooperation works better than just laying the blame on the military's or the PNP's doorsteps. Cooperation means actually saving lives, while ensuring that justice is promptly delivered.

These are my suggestions and I offer them with utmost sincerity and great respect.

This noon, President Arroyo asked the PAPI to become our partners in another endeavor: Project Whistleblower. We hope that PAPI will respond to this challenge so that PAPI can also work together with PAGC in fighting another scourge and that is corruption.

Before I end, let me offer my congratulations to a journalist and constitutional expert who I hold in high esteem, Atty. Napoleon Rama. This testimonial dinner is very much deserved by our honoree who continues to serve the country as a journalist and lawyer from the dark days of martial law until today.

Atty. Rama, Sir, I have given them a good story. Now I hope you can take care of the open bar.

Thank you and good evening.

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