CELEBRATING PRESS FREEDOM IN CEBU

Four times between 1984 and 1995, and every year since 1997, members of Cebu’s working press have gathered to celebrate Cebu Press Freedom Week. In 1996, the Cebu Council of Media Leaders (CCML) called off the celebration after being “stung by criticism about legitimacy and motives,” the Cebu Journalism and Journalists magazine has reported.

Today, questions about mainstream media’s legitimacy come mostly from the social media armies or “keyboard warriors” of political actors who wish to intimidate their critics into silence. No surprise then that for this year’s World Press Freedom Day last May 3, the United Nations chose to focus on “Keeping Power in Check: Media, Justice and the Rule of Law.”

Different riffs on the same theme will be explored in some of this year’s events in Cebu. The technology that gives citizens a more powerful voice continues to change the media landscape. But the communities that use it still need to be reminded about the guiding principles of freedom of expression and freedom of information.

Efforts to counter extremism and to prevent the spread of disinformation have increasingly led to calls to curtail press freedom and freedom of expression, and these have added a note of urgency to this year’s Cebu Press Freedom Week.

Everyone has the right to freedom of opinion and expression. This right includes freedom to hold opinions without interference and to seek, receive and impart information and ideas through any media and regardless of frontiers.

Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights