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‘Epidemic’ of SALN redactions in Duterte Cabinet mocks FOI —advocates

By MARGARET CLAIRE LAYUG, GMA News

The vetting by data protection officers made on public documents released by government offices is a mockery of the Freedom of Information Executive Order (FOI-EO) by President Rodrigo Duterte, according to FOI advocates.

On Friday, they raised concern over what they consider as an “epidemic of redaction" on documents concerning public officials, while the FOI-EO is in effect.

 

“We are sensing that some data privacy officers are so spooked by the threat of huge penalties that they would commit, should commit, a breach of privacy rights,” Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism (PCIJ) executive director Malou Mangahas said in a press conference.

Mangahas, who co-convenes the Right to Know Right Now (R2KRN) coalition, cited larger amount of information blacked out by “data privacy officers” of the Malacanang Records Office when they released the December 2016 Statements of Assets, Liabilities and Networth (SALNs) of Cabinet officials to Entrepreneur magazine upon request.

As reported by PCIJ’s Vino Lucero, the 29 SALNs given to the magazine on August 2017 bore "more significant" redactions compared to the documents acquired by the PCIJ in June 2016.

“June 30, 2016, wala pong redactions, kahit anong page. Pero ‘yung binigay po sa Entrepreneur, ganito po ‘yung itsura,” Lucero said, holding up a copy of Communications Secretary Martin Andanar’s SALN that had rows and rows of blotches made by a black marker.

 

 

Not only did Andanar’s  SALN have redacted details about his address, his spouse’s office address, name, date of birth, and ages of unmarried minor children, but also the description of his real properties, their exact location and acquisition costs, as well as the costing and acquisition of his personal properties. The officers had also blotched out details regarding his outstanding balance of liabilities, his financial connections’ and business interests’ address, and his ID number, along with his spouse’s.

Lucero said 60% of the officials in the same request had five to nine redactions each, with Justice Secretary Vitaliano Aguirre II and Health Secretary Paulyn Ubial coming second to Andanar. Aguirre and Ubial's SALNs each had nine types of details blacked out.

Mangahas said the PCIJ has raised the issue with the Civil Service Commission (CSC) and the Office of the Ombudsman within a series of meetings.

In a separate report, Mangahas stressed that the CSC maintains that the SALN Law must prevail over the Privacy act in releasing the public official’s document.

With respect to the Palace's sentiment of disseminated private information possibly endangering the officials’ personal life, Mangahas reiterated how “intense” blacking out of information gets in the way of seeing details that led to the rise of the officials’ wealth.

“Walang redactions. So you would imagine here, what a reporter could assume, things that should be explained, like why should the the net worth of certain cabinet members rise from P100,000 to P129,000 pesos in a matter if six months?” Mangahas said.

“Just to be clear, we told them that they might be overstepping their bounds because RA 6713 should be the reference law for SALNs. We were told by the Civil Service Commission lawyers, and lawyers with also the Ombudsman that that, on its face, could be unexplained wealth,” she added. “

"So we were telling the people in the PCOO (Presidential Communication Operations Office) and the OP (Office of the President) family that you’re not giving us any reasons to believe otherwise because you’ve redacted so many things in the SALN.”

Duterte was commended for having only one detail redacted on his SALN released to the PCIJ by the Ombudsman — his home address. — MDM/LBG, GMA News

Tags: pcij, philippinecenterforinvestigativejournalism, salnredaction
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