Tuesday, March 25, 2008 Seares: Keeping libel as a crime By Pachico A. Seares News Sense
TALK about decriminalizing libel has been going on and off the past few years. Now, it’s not just talk anymore. Pending are five bills in the Senate and two in the House.
While lawmaking grinds slowly, the bills may be passed sooner than skeptics think. Filers include top guns in the Senate and House, among them Senators Legarda, Roxas and Escudero and Speaker Nograles.
Journalists are being killed with impunity or oppressed with lawsuits filed far from their home or place of work. Bill authors think the press deserves a less punishing libel law.
To decriminalize is to make libel no longer a crime. It also means to lessen the penalty and that’s what all but one of the bills seek: take out the prison term and leave only the fine.
And more. The bills move the venue to the news outlet’s office of business and cut prescriptive period from one year to six months.
‘Hidden agenda’
Cebu print and broadcast editors who discussed the issue last March 5 and the Cebu Citizens-Press Council (CCPC) that held yesterday its quarterly meeting agree with keeping libel as a crime.
Retaining libel in the Penal Code is good for journalists: The offense still has to be proved “beyond reasonable doubt” and absence of malice is still a defense.
How about civil action for damages? It’s there, whether or not libel is decriminalized fully or partly.
But a reasonable cap on amount of the fine will enable journalists to avoid jail as subsidiary penalty.
Other than the lawmakers’ wish to show goodwill to the press and, yes, earn some “pogi” points, is there a catch, some “hidden agenda”?
I see no evil plot lurking in the shadows, not yet.
