The House committee hearing on Cebu ‘media corruption’
News sources and media
Banner headline (top) in SunStar of Dec. 19, 1992, by-lined Edralyn L. Benedicto, reporting on the hearing conducted the day before at the Cebu Capitol social hall in Cebu by the House committee on public information. Photos included Clavel Asas-Martinez lawyering for husband Congressman Junnie Martinez, and SunStar publisher Jesus Garcia Sr. Second headline announces date of hearing, later reset to Dec. 18.
The House committee hearing on Cebu ‘media corruption’
In December 1992 a House congressional committee investigated, “in aid of legislation,” an alleged conspiracy called ‘Operation Day One’ to smear the then new Cebu governor by corrupting local media.
More than three decades hence, Congress still has to produce a code of ethics for journalists from the hearing.
PACHICO A. SEARES
Published Jan. 26, 2025 in CJJ and in SunStar under the column “Media’s Public”
The House committee on public information scheduled hearings but was known to have held only one, in Cebu City no less, after which they announced they’d adopt a code of ethics for media in the country. Fast forward through 33 years:
The code drafting, let alone passage of the bill, didn’t happen.The Cebu investigation may be the first and only inquiry ever conducted by Congress on alleged media corruption. We’re not sure. There was no Google yet then:
Google was founded in 1998 and internet was then one-year-old. What was printed by local media in 1992 didn’t yet land in data bases of search engines.
What was printed at the time in newspapers and magazines could be the only published record, which may no longer be available even in newspaper files.
Google now and you’d probably not see a story or feature about a congressional investigation on media misconduct in Manila, Cebu or anywhere else in the country.
What came out of it: quick glance
Proponents of the hearing announced they’d “institutionalize” a national code of ethics for media. Which would’ve been constitutionally questionable as Congress had no power to legislate such rules without infringing on press freedom. A Cebu media group reminded the House committee that the code must come from media itself: their respective newsrooms or news organizations.
Until now, the idea of a legislated code of ethics has not evolved into a bill and law.
Yet many community news organization are guided by their own code or that that of the press association they belong to, such as Philippine Press Institute. SunStar adopted its own Code of Standards and Ethics in 1991, a year before the 1992 congressional hearing in Cebu, and amended it in 2004.
Governor de la Serna, who was purportedly the target of the “media conspiracy,” said he was satisfied with the hearing outcome because the SunStar publisher admitted that “payola is a reality for some media men who’re not well paid.” Which the publisher denied and contradicted. Which anyway didn’t resolve the question whether the specific allegation of media corruption was true.
The issue of a “Operation Day One” against dela Serna was not resolved.
One House committee hearing couldn’t thresh out the problem of corruption in media. Even the journalists themselves could not, as succeeding events tended to show.
One congressman reportedly said the issue divided media, which saddened him. And it will continue to be divisive as the few who are corrupted are not likely to join or sympathize with those who aren’t corrupted. Understandably, they can’t openly denounce the corruptors, mostly politicians themselves or their allies or supporters.
Then Cebu Gov. Vicente “Tingting” de la Serna (right) and Rep. Celestino “Junnie” Martinez of Cebu’s fourth district.
PERSONS IN “OPERATION DAY ONE’ DRAMA. First the politicians: (1) The Cebu governor, the late Vicente L. de la Serna (1992-1995 term ), who in that year 1992 just defeated in the May election the wife of his predecessor Emilio M.R. “Lito” Osmena (1988-1992 term).
(2) Then congressman and former Bogo mayor, the late Celestino Martinez Jr., who in a speech in the House of Representatives, using a 1986 story linking three columnists to an alleged KBL “propaganda group,” moved for a congressional inquiry, which the House conducted in Cebu City on Dec. 18, 1992.
(3) And there was Rolando Puaben, one of Guv Tingting’s trusted persons, who reportedly convinced the then new governor there was a media plot called “Operation Day One” to smear De la Serna’s name. His source: a “media man,” who later came out and publicly admitted that it was just a rumor he told Puaben eight years before.
An interesting footnote to Puaben’s character is that he allegedly appeared many times in court, posing as a member of the bar even though he was not. In connection with the NBI arrest of one Noel Ababa Maricuelo for allegedly falsely claiming to be a lawyer, Lloyd Suarez of GMA-7, in a May 14, 2017 column for CDN, recalled the case of Rolando Puaben (“ang usa sa mga sinaligan in kanhi gobernador Tingting de la Serna”) who, Suarez wrote, had similarly posed as a lawyer. Confronted with the falsehood, Puaben insisted he was an attorney, repeatedly saying, “Abogado lagi ko!” When asked for his attorney roll number and year, he didn’t give any. “Bay Lando,” Suarez said in his column, “espeso kaayog bakak ug pabaga sa nawong.”
The feature “Dossier” in SunStar of Nov. 21, 1992. The reproduced 1986 story, by-lined Eileen G. Mangubat (who later became editor-in-chief then publisher of Cebu Daily News), reported about “3 columnists linked to propaganda group.”
THE 1986 STORY. Three SunStar newspaper columnists who also worked as news correspondents of Manila-based newspapers were named in a SunStar story of April 5, 1986, by-lined Eileen G. Mangubat. Two of them publicly denied involvement, the third couldn’t be reached by the reporter but later reportedly said the purported document about the “plot” was spurious.
After the Martinez speech in the House in 1992, which created a tempest in the Cebu media community, Puaben was interviewed by a news reporter, to whom he denied he had talked with congressman Martinez or given him any document pertaining to “Operation Day One.” Puaben believed the congressman may have obtained information from “another person who attributed it to him (Puaben).” Later, Puaben denied he made the denial.
Rep. Junnie Martinez, interviewed by Cebu Capitol reporters, including (left) then SunStar reporter Michelle P. So. Years later, So became editor-in-chief.
‘NOT AN INVESTIGATION.’ Despite the apparently not-solid basis for it, the House committee on public information held a hearing in Cebu. First scheduled for Dec. 14, 1992, it was finally held on Dec. 18; instead of a hotel, the venue was the Capitol session hall.
What made it unusual was that it was held out of the country’s capital or the seat of Congress — and more extraordinarily, it looked into media conduct, which under the press freedom ambit was beyond its authority legally or traditionally.
Even as the purpose of the House committee hearing was accusatory — allegation of conspiracy of some media members with politicians and pay-off — then congressman Junnie Martinez told Capitol reporters on Nov. 27 [1992] the hearing “wouldn’t be an investigation but would be a venue to hear the side of the people allegedly involved in media corruption.”
Martinez complained, during the hearing and before it, of concerted attacks against him, denying though that the House inquiry was aimed to (a) hit back at critics of de la Serna and the congressman and (b) to “sidetrack” an incident in which Junnie allegedly slapped a traffic volunteer, an issue over which then Cebu City mayor and Martinez critic Tomas Osmena made a lot of noise.
AIDING LEGISLATION AS PURPOSE. Congressional authority to investigate anything and anyone “in aid of legislation” is not a new power or novel procedure that the House of Representatives and the Senate have just found useful and interesting and the nation has come to tap as source of entertainment and information.
Recent televised or streamed legislative inquiries into town mayor Alice Guo’s citizenship fraud scandal and the alleged misspending of public funds in the Office of the Vice President and Department of Education have drawn national attention.
Congressional hearings purportedly seek to inform the senators and congressmen on the bills that are filed to become law of the land.
The main purpose though is often derailed or obscured by other consideration not entirely noble or patriotic. Politics and its side interests tend to get into it, if it’s not the principal reason for dragging into the halls of Congress — and the national stage — enemies of a political administration, party or clan and the issue that would help push partisan cause and personal wellbeing.
True or not, suspicion of ugly motive would taint the congressional inquiry sought and obtained by politicians with ax to bury on their enemies.
‘PACKED SESSION HALL.’ More than three decades ago, the House committee on public information held a public hearing “in aid of legislation hearing,” in Cebu and about media conspiracy against its governor.
A Page 1 Dec. 19, 1992 banner story in what was then SunStar Daily, bylined Edralyn L. Benedicto, said the committee headed by Rep. Jesus Dureza was held at “a packed Capitol social hall.”
None of the journalists formally invited by the committee showed up. The invitees included the three columnists cum news correspondents, along with KBP Cebu president Manny Rabacal and Manuel Satorre Jr., then editor of Newstime Daily.
High-profile officials at the hearing included (top photo, from left) Rep. Antonio Cuenco, Gov. Vicente de la Serna, and Reps. Eduardo R. Gullas and Raul del Mar. In lower photo, far right: then SunStar publisher Jesus Garcia Sr.
Governor de la Serna attended the hearing; so did Reps. Antonio Cuenco, Eduardo Gullas, and Raul del Mar from Cebu as well as Reps. Erico Aumentado of Bohol and Dante Liban of Quezon City.
Among the lawyers present were Clavel Asas-Martinez, wife of Rep. Celestino Martinez; Jesus Garcia Sr., publisher of SunStar Daily and the paper’s chief legal counsel; and lawyer-broadcaster Miguel Enriquez, representing the then CCML or Cebu Council of Media Leaders. (The three lawyers are also deceased, with former congresswoman Clavel’s passing away at 82 on Jan. 20, 2025.)
TWO GRIEVANCES. What set off the House investigation were grievances from two local politicians, namely:
(1) Governor de la Serna’s accusation of a “concerted effort by some media men paid by his opponents to discredit him from the time he assumed office” on June 30, 1992, said to be evidenced by the papers of de la Serna’s p.r. man Rolando Puaben relating to the so-called Operation Day One; and
(2) Kong Martinez’s grievance that three newspaper columnists had been attacking him — apparently forming a “pattern,” he said, in 1985 and 1986 — which he said can be seen from newspaper clippings of the said columns and from a statement of the then publisher Jesus Garcia Sr.
Along with Martinez’s evidence in the form of news clips must come de la Serna’s evidence from Puaben allegation.
FOCUS: ALLEGED MEDIA MANIPULATION, FALSE INFORMATION, CORRUPTION. Specifically, the legislators wanted to look into the allegation that came from their own ranks, particularly Cong Martinez who repeated the charge he had earlier raised outside Congress that some columnists waged a smear campaign against him and were peddling false information in collusion with and order from his political rivals.
According to the Edralyn Benedicto story of Dec. 19, 1992, the House committee zeroed in on SunStar and submitted at the committee hearing the same materials, mostly news clippings, he had given in a press conference last month showing alleged media manipulation activities of some SunStar columnists in 1986. Martinez, the Benedicto story said, also presented as “evidence” the papers showing SunStar’s previous ownership by Anos Fonacier, “a Marcos crony.”
MEDIA RESPONSE TO HOUSE HEARING. — SUKNA RESOLUTION: Sukna — short for Sugboanong Komentarista nga Nagpakabana, an association of commentators mostly from broadcast — in a Dec. 1, 2022 resolution opposed “any congressional investigation of media.” Sukna expressed “solidarity and trust with the management of SunStar Daily and other tri-media outlets in their capability to maintain objectivity and fairness in upholding press freedom.”
Unusual content on SunStar’s Page 1: Statements (from top) from the editor-in-chief, Oct. 5, and the publisher, Nov. 23 and Nov. 28, all in the same year 1992.
SUNSTAR COMMENTS: An Oct. 7, 1992 top-of-opinion-section piece “from the editor-in-chief” of SunStar Cebu, examined the Puaben information that fueled the de la Serna assault on media. The title read: “De la Serna contributed to fiasco by buying his p.r. man’s tale.” “Oh my God,” a line said after tracing the source of Puaben tale, “That means, the governor bought a story that was a double or triple hearsay.”
The following day, Oct. 8, 1992, a second “from the editor-in-chief” piece — this time located above the Page 1 banner-headline — said in its title, “Media need solid proof on ‘conspiracy’ to cleanse their ranks of corruption.”
Columnists Simeon Dumdum Jr. and Leonardo Chiu weighed in with their views on “Operation Day One.”
The day before, Oct. 7, SunStar columnist Simeon Dumdum Jr. lightly poked at the name of the conspiracy, “Operation Day One,” but seriously noted that one Visitacion, the reporter who was reportedly Puaben’s source of information, said de la Serna’s publicist “played fast and loose” with his material that ”mostly came from gossip.” It didn’t help that a few years later, Puaben was accused of usurping the title of lawyer.
Another Page 1 feature — not the kind the reader sees often — was a Nov. 23 piece “from the publisher,” Jesus Garcia Sr., which reaffirmed the trust of the publisher and other SunStar officers in its editors and other journalists and their “capacity to observe the standards and ethics of journalism.” “Despite the avowed good intentions behind the Congress inquiry,” the statement said, “it sidetracks the principal issue of a public official’s behavior.”
Columnist Leonardo V. Chiu wrote on Nov. 23, 1922 that Cebuanos “deserve an apology” from the governor and the congressman over the attack on media. In another column — reproduced by CJJ in this section, right after this article, and titled “Media people know who corrupts whom” — Chiu (who passed away Aug. 14, 2015) tells how it is or was in Cebu on the issue of corruption.
RELATED: “Media people know who corrupts whom.“
SUGGESTION TO MEDIA. A SunStar suggestion to journalists was published earlier, before the December House committee hearing, in an editorial titled, “To resist manipulation, media must do its job well.”
The concluding paragraph said: “In journalism schools, future reporters and editors are repeatedly told: You are not clerks who merely take down what the news sources say. You have minds that should work to see if the information and opinion given you can pass standard tests on truth, accuracy, and plain good sense.” “If reporters and editors do their job well, government officials who behave like pompous asses will have more respect for the journalists but, more important, for the public that media personnel represent and serve.” 