Staff of ABS-CBN Watch Last Moments of Airtime After Being Ordered to Cease Operations
ABS-CBN, the Philippines’ largest television network, was ordered to cease operations on May 5 after President Rodrigo Duterte’s allies in Congress refused to renew the station’s 25-year license.
The National Telecommunications Commission (NTC) said ABS-CBN’s license expired on May 4 and gave the station 10 days to respond.
ABS-CBN management said in a statement that it would abide by the order and stopped operations on May 5.
Video posted online by Nick Villavecer, a writer and producer with the network, shows staff in the newsroom in Quezon City as they watched the last few moments of the network’s broadcast.
“There was clapping in the newsroom. But there was crying, too. I still do not know how to process this,” said Villavecer in an accompanying tweet.
ABS-CBN has been a target of President Duterte since refusing to air some of his campaign advertisements in 2016.
According to an ABS-CBN executive quoted by CNN Philippines, the ads were rejected because of timing, not because of a political agenda: “Our policy on all our ads is first-come, first-served. Many of these spots were ordered on May 3, and May 7 was the last day of the campaign period. There had been many previous telecast orders that came in ahead.”
Congress member Arlene Brosas condemned the move as a “brazen clampdown of the freedom of the press” in a speech in the House of Representatives on May 5.
The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines issued a statement calling on “the community of independent Filipino journalists and on all Filipinos who cherish democracy and liberty to stand together and resist this government’s brazen assault on freedom of the press and of expression.” Credit: Nick Villavecer via Storyful
