A Philippine court on Thursday convicted a journalist on charges of financing terrorism and sentenced her to more than a decade in prison, in a ruling that rights and press groups said was a blatant attack on press freedom.
The Regional Trial Court in Tacloban City gave the journalist, Frenchie Mae Cumpio, and her former roommate Marielle Dumaquil a jail sentence of 12 to 18 years, the maximum allowed. But the women, who have been in prison since they were arrested in 2020, were acquitted of charges of possessing firearms and explosives.
Before her arrest, Ms. Cumpio, who turns 27 this month, worked as a radio reporter and wrote articles for Eastern Vista, an online publication focused on the Eastern Visayas region of the Philippines. The authorities said her coverage of the community and local politics was biased in favor of communist insurgents, who have long had a presence in the region. She was convicted of being a conduit for funds for the rebels.
To many, Ms. Cumpio’s case was a glaring example of “red-tagging,” a practice by some Filipino authorities of linking their critics to the communist insurgency. She was arrested when Rodrigo Duterte was in power, a president who repeatedly attacked his critics in the media and moved to silence them. His successor and the current president of the Philippines, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., had vowed to support a free press in the Philippines.
“This absurd verdict shows that the various pledges made by President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. to uphold press freedom are nothing but empty talk,” said Beh Li Yih, the Asia-Pacific director of the Committee to Protect Journalists. “Although the journalist was cleared on the charge of illegal possession of firearms, the ruling underscores the lengths that Philippine authorities are willing to go to silence critical reporting.”
“The Philippines must free Frenchie Mae Cumpio without conditions and stop criminalizing journalists,” she continued.
Reporters Without Borders, an organization that advocates press freedom, said it had carried its own investigation into the allegations against the women and concluded that it was a fabricated case.
“We are appalled by this verdict,” said Aleksandra Bielakowska, the advocacy manager for the group. She added that the conviction was a “devastating failure on the part of the Philippine justice system and the authorities’ blatant disregard for press freedom.”
A spokesman for the government’s National Task Force to End Local Communist Armed Conflict said the ruling was “a clear affirmation” that the justice system worked because the court threw out the weapons possession charge against Ms. Cumpio.
“This alone demolishes the false narrative that the courts are mere rubber stamps for the state or instruments of political persecution,” Joel Sy Egco, the spokesman, said in a statement. “It shows judicial independence.”
Ms. Cumpio and Ms. Dumaquil are expected to appeal the ruling.
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