“Press freedom” activists and leftist groups up in arms over conviction of commie “journalist” Frenchie Mae Cumpio on charges of terrorist financing

Filipino “journalist” Frenchie Mae Cumpio was recently handed a guilty verdict by a Philippine court on charges of terrorist financing. As expected, a who’s-who of communist sympathisers and “press freedom groups” are now up in arms over the outcome crying bloody “travesty of justice”.

On cue, a multitude of mainstream media organisations focus their “reports” on this story on the opinions of people who are sympathetic to the communist cause. For example, the New York Times “report” goes straight into a sampling of allegations from these camps that all this was just “a glaring example of ‘red-tagging,’ a practice by some Filipino authorities of linking their critics to the communist insurgency.” The Times then buttresses this with a quote from, who else, Beh Li Yih, the Asia-Pacific director of the Committee to Protect Journalists…

“Although the journalist was cleared on the charge of illegal possession of firearms, the ruling underscores the lengths that Philippine authorities are willing to go to silence critical reporting.”

“The Philippines must free Frenchie Mae Cumpio without conditions and stop criminalizing journalists,” she continued.

The Times also quotes another similarly-aligned source, the so-called group Reporters Without Borders which claimed “it had carried out its own investigation into the allegations against the women and concluded that it was a fabricated case.”

“We are appalled by this verdict,” said Aleksandra Bielakowska, the advocacy manager for the group. She added that the conviction was a “devastating failure on the part of the Philippine justice system and the authorities’ blatant disregard for press freedom.”

Credit goes to the Philippine Star which reports on the facts behind the bases for Cumpio’s conviction…

The court found that the prosecution successfully established all three elements required for a conviction under Section 8(ii) of RA 10168 [also known as the Terrorism Financing Prevention and Suppression Act of 2012]:

a. The offender is not an accomplice under Section 6 or accessory under Section 7;
b. The offender makes available any property or funds or financial services or other related services; and
c. The recipient of the property, funds, or financial or related services is a designated person or organization.

The court concluded that the prosecution successfully established all three elements required for a conviction.

The court said that based on the prosecution’s evidence, the two accused did not merely act as accomplices or accessories but were shown to have directly provided cash and various supplies, including ammunition, to members of the Communist Party of the Philippines-New People’s Army (CPP-NPA) in Catbalogan City in March 2019.

Nonetheless, leading the charge to discredit the verdict are notable communist publications and media groups like Pinoy Weekly and Altermidya both of which have strong links to the terrorist arm of the Communist Party of the Philippines (CPP), the New People’s Army (NPA). In an article dated the 18th January 2024 authored by “Altermidya Network”, Pinoy Weekly referred to Cumpio as “our member”…

Altermidya takes strong exception to Undersecretary Paul Gutierrez’s accusation and red-tagging of our member, Ms. Frenchie Mae Cumpio.

…and then asserts…

This is exactly what we mean by red-tagging: a senior government official linking civilians to alleged communist groups without proof.

Interestingly, these “legitimate” news organisations that Cumpio is evidently a member of seem to have ready access to the NPA. In the 2017 article “Five Reasons Why the World’s Longest Communist Revolution is Still Going Strong”, a photo showing what look like armed combatants in “full battle gear” in formation as part of an event marking the anniversary of the CPP is credited to a certain “Boy Bagwis of Pinoy Weekly”.

Another photo featured in the same article showing crowds gathered for that same occassion with the iconic hammer and sickle logo of the world’s communists in full view is credited to the media advocacy Altermidya.

Articles in the Pinoy Weekly website authored by “Boy Bagwis” also exhibit photos that evidently put him in close contact with the NPA as this one featured in the article (title translated to English) “Revolution in the Southern Tagalog Continues” shows.

Pinoy Weekly is cited as a “member of the Altermidya” in a tweet fielded recently by the official Twitter account of the group as part of a thread that denounces a recent police operation that raided the Bulacan office of squatter advocacy group KADAMAY in Pandi where copies of the publication were seized and a “local urban poor leader” arrested for having these in her possession.

Not surprisingly, a who’s who of top honchos of known communist front groups such as Raoul Manuel, President of the National Union of Students of the Philippines (NUSP), have come to the defense of Pinoy Weekly.

So is Frenchie Mae Cumpio a komunista simpatiko? Or was she “unjustly” “red-tagged” by the “forces of fascism”? Abangan ang susunod na kabanata.