Wednesday, July 16, 2008 Reporting the fish scare, execution-style murders
MEDIA handling of two issues has drawn critical comment from sectors of the public affected by them: the fish scare and recent execution-style killings of persons.
Fish vendors who sought the help of Talisay City Mayor Soc Fernandez and the City Council complain that for several weeks now since the Sulpicio tragedy they haven’t been able to sell their fish. People simply don’t buy fish anymore or buy much less fish than they used to.
They’re not earning enough to feed themselves and their families. They can’t repay borrowed capital, and even if they can get cash, they can’t sell the fish.
It’s the fault of media, the newspapers and the radio, the vendors say. They spread the news that the fish sold in Cebu could be fish from the Romblon sea where mv Princess of the Stars sank and with it the toxic waste cargo and the bodies of people trapped in the ship.
Sun.Star ran one or two stories about the danger of eating fish from there, but only because the source was the Department of Health (DOH).
Speculations on the story run by media spread by word of mouth and, yes, jokes on radio about how fish could travel in the country’s archipelagic waters.
What was lacking apparently was enough and quick assurance from the DOH and Bureau of Fisheries and Aquatic Resources (Bfar). Authorities worried so much over search, rescue and retrieval that they didn’t give much thought to the collateral damage done on the fish industry and the small people who depend on it for a living.
Were Sun.Star and other media wrong in reporting the DOH warning? It was part of the duty of the press to report any probable threat on public health and safety. And they did.
Were Sun.Star and other media remiss in reporting assurances of public officials that fish was safe to eat? Media prominently ran stories and photos about VIPs eating fish at the public market and published statements from DOH, Bfar, and, yes, the fish vendors’ plea.
Those “impunity” killings
Cebu City police chief Patrocinio Comendador asked media the other day not to unduly alarm the public by reporting on the murder killing of three persons in separate incidents of “salvaging” in a span of eight hours.
Comendador said media was sensationalizing and giving the impression that the city is a dangerous place.
To sensationalize is to give a story more than its value or importance.
The story apparently didn’t have much value or importance to the police that has been unable or unwilling to solve cases of execution-style murders.
The fact is that not one of the more than 180 executions listed by media was solved. It was quiet for sometime, then the “salvagings” resumed, with victims mostly suspects who had just been released on bail or whose cases were dropped by the prosecutors.
Last Saturday and Sunday, the papers reported about three persons murdered in a span of eight hours, staged in the same easy but scary fashion (gunmen on board motorcycles and fleeing after the shooting with no cop stopping them).
It is sensationalism to the police chief, but to us it is giving the story its true worth.
The press has valid reasons: (one) to tell the public that there’s something wrong with a community that allows assassins to kill with impunity, and (two) to prod the police to do its job of keeping peace and order without coddling serial killers. – (PAS)
