DUMAGUETE CITY (PNA) — Media practitioners in Dumaguete City have signed a manifesto urging Negros Oriental Vice Governor Jose Baldado to be more circumspect and discerning in protecting his good name and office.

“We, concerned members of the Dumaguete media note with serious concern the attempt of Vice Governor Jose Baldado, through provincial employee Yuri Fontelo, to twist facts in order to malign certain personalities in our ranks,” read the manifesto signed by Juancho Gallarde, Maricar Aranas, Alex Pal, Rene Genove, Roy Bustillo, Glynda Descuatan, Irma Faith Pal, DX Lapid, Judy Flores-Partlow, Cyril Repe, Bing Aguilar, and Ely Dejaresco.

The manifesto was referring to a press release issued to several media outlets last March 12, 2010, attributing certain statements to P/Sr. Supt. Augusto Marquez Jr., Provincial Police Director against Philippines News Agency(PNA) Bureau Chief, Judy Flores-Partlow.

Marquez was quoted in the press release as saying that a news item written by Partlow which appeared in the Visayan Daily Star was “highly erroneous, grossly malicious and sensationalized.” These were all denied by Marquez in a subsequent interview.

The news article which prompted the writing and distribution of the press release from the Baldado camp was in relation to an alleged kidnapping case of a minor that implicated Baldado. The Vice Governor was later charged in court for kidnapping, child abuse and grave threat.

In the same press release, Fontelo quoted Baldado as saying that he “deplored the malicious and sensationalized reporting as an attempt to besmirch his name and good standing in the community as he is running for Governor in the May 2010 elections.”

Said media practitioners said those statements attributed to the Vice-Governor, in effect,”put the wrong words in the mouth of another public official, demeaning the institutions that they both serve.”

The manifesto has been signed by a number of media personalities in Dumaguete last Monday.

Local media further called on the Vice Governor to investigate acts of harassment by Dindo Generoso, a person closely associated with him, who has been sending text messages to Partlow and Alex Pal, publisher of local news publication, MetroPost.
“We also deplore the actuations of certain people who call themselves members of the media who sell their services to politicians to act as their public relations people, violating the principle of neutrality of journalists," underlined said Dumaguete media.

“The actuations of these individuals who try to pass themselves off as journalists are giving a bad name to the profession which we zealously guard,” they added, even as they called on the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster ng Pilipinas (KBP) and the Dumaguete Press Club to strictly enforce the provisions of the Broadcast or the Journalist Code of Ethics.