Focus: Palace-ABS relations in a test

The stampede at the Ultra last Saturday that killed 79 people will put to a test the relations between the GMA administration and the owners of ABS-CBN. Will this tragedy lead to a dialogue between the government and the Lopez family en route to reconciliation? Or will the relations between the two, forged during the campaign to oust Erap, deteriorate?

We keenly observed on television the president's visit to the Ultra where we saw her order health secretary Francisco Duque to help the victims in their medical needs. In the course of her inspection, she also ordered the DILG to investigate why the incident occurred.

But it was very obvious that she did not see or talk with the ABS executives who were in the area, a decision that is most likely deliberate. ABS chairman Gabby Lopez and his uncle, Manuel, were in the area, supervising the rescue but they did not reach out to the president even for the most minimum courtesy. Apparently the president left the task of coordinating with the ABS to Vice President Noli de Castro.

Let us state the undeniable: GMA and the Lopez family have been at odds since the impeachment trial of the president last year. It was obvious even then that the Lopez family had used its media facilities - DZMM, Channel 2, ANC and its cable networks - to carry stories against the president and her administration. At that time, it was said that the network reporters were even instructed to give full play to opposition statements.

The problem was that the president won in the impeachment vote and the Lopezes lost in the gamble. While the family can continue its opposition stance, it cannot be denied that it has to deal with the GMA administration on a day-to-day basis. After the all the administration still maintains regulatory powers over many of the corporations that the Lopez family owns. As is well-known, the Lopezes own electric, water and construction firms that are imbued with public interest.

One example is WOWOWEE, a television program that is the root of the tragedy last Saturday. The government, through the MTRCB, can suspend the program on grounds of protecting public interest. If GMA wants to assert the power of the state and the law, she can do this. But whether she will do this remains to be seen.

But our view is that she must assert her power now, for the sake of public interest. She cannot leave the program to exploit the ignorance and poverty of the people just to improve one's television ratings and to make more profit.

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BRIEF NOTES. It was a reverse role for the executives of the ABS-CBN last Saturday when they had to assume the role as news source instead of chroniclers. Instead of asking questions, they were the ones being grilled by reporters....... The hardest question was related to why ABS was trying to encourage the culture of the beggar ("kultura ng palimos") by having such programs as WOWOWEE....... The executives replied that they were just helping the poor..... I am not sure if there are similar programs abroad like WOWOWEE, even in ASEAN whose standard of living is almost similar to ours..... I notice that the program of Willie Revillame promotes a kind of law of averages which means that one person will have the chance to win one million out of some many hundreds of thousand participants.... In the process, the poor salivate for money, and in the process, improve the ratings of the network..... Perhaps, there ought to be a law on this.... This is where a Senate hearing is needed....