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| Photos courtesy of Rappler and ABS-CBN |
Rappler CEO Maria Ressa's conviction of libel charges filed against her by businessman William Keng because of libelous column written by Rappler columnist Reynaldo Santos Jr. has alarmed the international media and even political personalities as well.
In an opinion article by Mr. Rigoberto Tiglao, resident columnist of the Manila Times, he explained how the libelous article of Rappler damaged the former chief justice Renato Corona that oust him from his post.
According to Tiglao how despicable it is, that Maria Ressa and her Yellow crowd have been shouting to the world that her criminal conviction for libel for a Rappler article was suppression of the press.
And how they manage to point out that President Duterte is behind all of this and that the Philippines has degenerated into a country where freedom of the press no longer exists.
I have never seen such hypocrisy on such a scale, the former cabinet official sighed in frustration.
Tiglao added that If there is any president involved in this issue, it is former president Benigno Aquino 3rd, whose Yellow Cult to this day has been a fan and, I strongly suspect, even a financier of Rappler.
Regional Trial Court Judge Rainelda Estasio-Montesa ruled the criminally libelous article by Rappler was one of the most disgusting and offensive, immoral and depraved political campaigns in our history.
Aquino mistakenly presumed that with Corona’s removal, the court would reverse its ruling on the outcome of his family’s Hacienda Luisita, and that would give it P2 billion more in agrarian-reform compensation.
This was Aquino‘s assault on the Supreme Court in 2012 that removed then-Chief Justice Renato Corona and replaced him with Maria Lourdes Sereno, the most unqualified chief justice ever but the most servile to the president and the Yellows.
The infamous Rappler’s libelous piece was first posted in May 2012, published again with some editing in February 2014 and after the enactment of the Cybercrime Prevention Act of 2012 which penalizes libel committed through the internet. The said article hasn’t been taken down to this day, as an astonishing display of impunity.
In fact, There many news stories of the well-financed and well-organized propaganda campaign to smear the reputation of Corona, in order to provide the justification for the House of Representatives to impeach him, and the Senate to pronounce him guilty in the impeachment trial that started in January 2012.
The campaign to remove Corona had a fund of at least P200 million for its direct operations especially for media, taken from the P200 billion that was put under Aquino’s discretion under the another controversial Disbursement Acceleration Program (DAP) funds.
The main true target of that libelous article of Rappler was not really businessman Wilfredo Keng, who filed the libel case against Santos Jr. and Ressa.
But obviously, from the article’s title itself “CJ using SUVs of controversial businessman”, was aimed to smear Corona’s integrity, suggesting that Keng was Corona’s crony.
The article claimed that he was “under surveillance by the National Security Council for alleged involvement in illegal activities, namely “human trafficking and drug smuggling.”
Aside from smear campaign, the article also claimed that Keng was a high-level criminal “involved in a murder case for which he was never jailed.”
Keng was also accused of “smuggling fake cigarettes and granting special investors residence to Chinese nationals,”
Although the low-profile Keng isn’t known even to most media members, he was listed by Forbes magazine as the 23nd richest Filipino in 2010 with a net worth of $100 million.
Now do you understand why Keng was so angry at the article that he pursued his libel case? What’s the use of your money if some media would destroy your reputation in such a cavalier manner?
The anti-Corona plotters propagandists’ message was that Corona was so dirty that his friends were “criminals” such as Keng. Their message was that if Keng could lend Corona an SUV, then he would probably have given him millions of pesos too.
The black propagandists calculated and succeeded on how to summon Keng to the Senate and grilled him about his association with CJ Corona, who was known in the legal community as an upright work-to-home kind of person.
After the successful hearing, the Senate apparently was so satiated with their DAP money, apparently P200 million per senator that it called for a vote earlier than expected, on May 29, 2012.
The said article was no longer needed and was forgotten in the celebration by the Yellows over their achievement in taking out the Chief Justice of the Republic, the first time this was done.
But certainly not for Keng whose businesses suffered because the Rappler's damaging article which depicted him as connected with criminals.
According to the court records, his wife and two daughters “have been ridiculed and judged by friends and acquaintances and labeled as associated with drug lords and smugglers.”
Until February 2017, Keng continuously tried to get Rappler to take down the article, using several intermediaries, including a well-known congressman.
Exasperated and not the kind of businessman to ask “how much?” Keng decided to file the libel complaint against Rappler which the arraignment finally starting on May 14, 2019.
The libelous article also claimed that Keng’s criminal activities were contained in a National Security Council document.
However the author, Reynaldo Santos Jr., was a new reporter and he had not written anything at all on CJ Corona's impeachment; it is impossible for him to have acquired a “National Security Council” document that detailed the alleged criminal activities of Keng or the photos that accompanied the article of the purported SUV Corona used.
Who could have gotten that “document” if not Vitug who was close to and wrote the biography of President Fidel Ramos’ National Security Adviser Jose Almonte, who is known to have retained his network in the council.
This was all because of the editor-at-large” Marites Dañguilan-Vitug. who was obviously part of the propaganda team for Corona’s conviction.
She published an article Dec. 22, 2017 in Rappler which was the first damaging salvo of the media campaign to smear the chief justice. It was titled “UST breaks rules to favor Corona: Chief Justice finished doctorate without required dissertation.”
Vitug’s role in the article didn’t end in 2012 or 2014. According to the court decision, Keng’s lawyer Leonard de Vera communicated with Vitug to ask Rappler to take down the libelous article.
But instead, Vitug told the lawyer that a reporter would be assigned to get Keng’s side, which would be posted on the website, and the libelous article would be taken down.
A reporter did talk to Keng, and she told the court that she had submitted the article to her editors. Rappler, however, never published the article and didn’t take down the libelous piece.
Why would Ressa, the top honcho at Rappler, assign Vitug, who only works on a part-time basis at Rappler, to handle the complaint? Was Ressa telling her, “This is your mess, clean it up!”?
The big question though is why Ressa approved it, and why she has refused to take it down to this day.
Truth will out, and on the day it does, it will expose Ressa as one of the biggest frauds in international media history, and the US media establishment, yes the same one which sold to the world the idea that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction in 2003 and proceeded to destroy that ancient country, which has glorified her as the most gullible in the world.
Corona died of cardiac arrest, aged 67, on April 29, 2016, four years after he was removed as chief justice. I sincerely believe those who conspired to plot his removal are to blame for his untimely death.
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