Some groups

Since daybreak of Monday, September 3, to about 11:30 a.m. of the same day when I got around to start writing this, Philippine journalist Pia Gutierrez, who is apparently part of the media delegation covering President Duterte’s trip to Israel and Jordan, kept reporting on ANC about “some groups” demanding an apology from Duterte about prior “Hitler” remarks.

I do not now recall what exactly those remarks were and Pia never made any attempt to put her report into context by recalling those remarks either. Doing so would have done her audience a great service by refreshing their memory. Expecting people to know exactly what she was talking about is, to say the least, shoddy journalism.

At first I had been willing to let her initial reports go. Maybe the details were unavailable early on, as they often mostly are. But as the day wore on, and her periodic reports started becoming regular in ANC’s hourly newscasts, it became irritatingly clear that no attempt was being made to make clear who these “some groups” exactly were.

Since there were reportedly “some groups” it should have been made clear just exactly how many “some” are and who exactly they were. This is important considering that the supposed demands for a presidential apology are in relation to a presidential visit to a foreign country.

Were there five groups demanding an apology, or were there just three? Or maybe there were more, like say 18 groups all chorusing for a Duterte mea culpa. But the numbers were never defined. In fact they were never identified. Did the groups have names? Do they have real advocacies? Did they even have addresses?

It was also not made clear if the groups were made up of Filipinos or if they were Israelis. All of these details are essential to give sense to the story. Perhaps, when this column sees print as scheduled on Wednesday, all of these details shall have been supplied. And will be well and good.

But from the initial report on Monday until the time I started writing this on the same day, too much time and opportunity have passed to get and report these details but we’re not, in effect leaving the audience hanging and twisting in the wind with each incomplete reporting.

This is probably why there is no love lost between Duterte and some sectors in the media. I, too, would be incensed by reports about “some groups” demanding some things from me without me getting told who these groups are, how many and how big they are and where they are based. Do they even truly exist, for crying out loud?

‘It should have been made clear just exactly how many “some” are and who exactly they were.’