ABS-CBN employees and press freedom advocates gather in front of the ABS-CBN Broadcasting Center in Quezon City on May 5, 2021, a year after the network went off air. Mark Demayo, ABS-CBN News/file
MANILA — The shutdown of ABS-CBN's broadcast operations continues to be felt 3 years after the government ordered its closure, the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility (CMFR) has said.
The CMFR emphasized that far-flung communities suffered the most due to what it described as "abuse of state power."
"ABS-CBN had 143 broadcast stations nationwide in places where other channels did not want to go. Its closure was therefore a major blow to the industry, cut off communities where only ABS-CBN could give them free TV," CMFR executive director Melinda Quintos de Jesus told a forum Wednesday, World Press Freedom day.
On May 5, 2020, the National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) ordered ABS-CBN's free TV and radio broadcasts to go off the air following the expiration of its franchise.
Two months later, the House Committee on Legislative Franchises voted to "kill" ABS-CBN's bid for a new broadcast franchise.
Looking back, De Jesus said the franchise renewal should have been a "routine."
"The [House panel] denied ABS-CBN's application after they operated and succeeded in its last 50-year franchise. It should have been routine. And yet it turned out to be a disaster which all of you should simply accept and understand as abuse of state power," she said.
After 3 years, the CMFR reported that ABS-CBN content is now airing in nearly 50 channels, but it is only a third of its previous reach.
"ABS-CBN is now currently airing on 49 broadcast stations nationwide. This number is only 34.27 percent of the 143 stations prior to its closure," De Jesus noted.
According to De Jesus, the "chilling effect" of ABS-CBN's shutdown still hounds newsroom to this day.
"That closure... suggested to all newsrooms, to the owners of news enterprises, that this can happen to you too. And that contained the impact, the impulse to get the stories, to look for stories, to search out the stories and stay in a quiet safe zone," she said.
“Nakikita namin na maraming issue na hindi na nare-report, maraming storya na hindi na sinusundan, tumitigil na pagkatapos magsalita yung mga opisyal," she added in another interview.
National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) chairperson Jonathan de Santos meanwhile said that Filipino journalists also picked up a lesson from the ABS-CBN shutdown.
“Ang isa sa mga natutunan natin ay kailangan nating magtulungan, kailangan nating suportahan ang isa't isa sa mga ganitong threats," he said.
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