Two men who said they support President Rodrigo Duterte and his administration staged a protest yesterday outside the Pasig City office of embattled news website Rappler.
Mark Lopez and Jovybev Aquino said they went to Rappler’s office to prove to Rappler chief executive officer Maria Ressa that they were real people and not trolls.
They did this after they were offended by a tweet from Ressa wherein the award-winning journalist said that accounts were deployed to “troll/convince” former Secretary of State Madeleine Albright, CNN journalist Christiane Amanpour, and Canadian Foreign Minister Chrystia Freeland that they were wrong in supporting Ressa.
The accounts deployed also seemed to get marching orders to troll/convince @madeleine @camanpour @cafreeland and others they were wrong. https://t.co/aUFIcN0nKS
— Maria Ressa (@mariaressa) February 16, 2019
Albright, Amanpour, and Freeland expressed support for Ressa after she was arrested at Rappler’s office for cyber libel last week.
In his video posted on Facebook, Lopez referred to Ressa’s tweet and said in a mix of English and Filipino: “We can’t take that tweet. We can’t take that, me and Jovybev. That’s a huge slap to us because what she’s saying there is that we are just trolls, that we are just accepting marching orders from somebody else. We are here to prove to Ms. Ressa that we are not trolls. That we are here to express our outrage.”
Aquino butted in and said: “To fight for our country. They are destroying our country and we are not going to sit here and let them do it.”
Lopez also showed a piece of paper on camera which said: “As a Filipino, I am going to hold Maria Ressa and Rappler accountable for destroying the image of my country!”
Duterte supporters have vilified Rappler and Ressa for their critical stance on the president. Duterte himself has called Rappler “a fake news outlet” after it published a report that alleged his long-time assistant, Christopher “Bong” Go, got involved in the selection of the Philippine Navy’s suppliers, a multi-billion peso project.
Lopez also accused Ressa of embarrassing the country because she said that there was a curtailment of press freedom.
For his part, Aquino held a piece of paper which said: “I am not a troll acting on anyone’s marching orders. I am 100 percent Filipino who loves this country more than an American can ever do.”
Aquino also told Ressa to “close up shop.”
The video also shows that some Rappler staff were taking videos and photos of the two men.
After a few minutes, two security guards told the men to leave, saying that they don’t have the right to protest outside a private property. They were led into an elevator by the guards and were escorted outside the building.
In a Facebook Messenger chat with Coconuts Manila, Lopez said: “No one from Rappler approached us even as they were recording with video and photo our protest. No one from their staff came out to engage with us or get our side.”
Lopez added that he felt offended by Ressa’s tweet. “I felt so offended and outraged by Ressa’s tweet that insinuates an organized troll attack acting on orders of somebody (presumably the Duterte admin) to Albright, Amanpour, Acosta (sic)… But most of all, [I] am outraged with the deception in the international media.”
Lopez told Coconuts that he had personally tweeted to Albright and Amanpour about Ressa in the past, but his Twitter account had been suspended.
In a statement, Rappler said that the two men’s sudden appearance went too far.
“We have been used to online attacks and lies against us by loyalists of the President. But this takes it to a new level,” the statement reads.
It added: “We have taken all precautionary measures to ensure the safety of our staff. We will be the last to question any peaceful form of protest even if, and especially if, against us. But we take seriously the incitement to violence found in the post (Lopez’s live video).”
Aside from cyber libel, Ressa is facing tax evasion charges filed against her by the government. She, other journalists, and human rights advocates have called the charges politically motivated because Rappler has been critical of Duterte.
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