Meet Maria Ressa, the woman at the forefront of the battle for press freedom under the Duterte regime in the Philippines. Founder and CEO of online news website Rappler, this fierce journalist is a force to reckon with in investigative journalism.

In 2010, Esquire magazine declared her as the “sexiest Asian woman alive”. The citation read, “Despite her size, fearless enough to write an eyewitness account of Al-Qaeda”. The misogyny of that statement aside, she approved of it and tweeted out, “unorthodox choice”.

In a career spanning more than three decades in journalism, she has reported on terrorism, breaking major stories after 9/11, reporting on the terror cells in Philippines, and jihadi networks in Southeast Asia. Ressa is now earning the ire of President Rodrigo Duterte’s regime for critical reporting on its online propaganda wars and state-sanctioned extrajudicial killings which has taken over 8,000 lives.

Born in the Philippines, Ressa moved to the US as a child with her parents in the early 1970s. After finishing college at Princeton University, she came back to the Philippines on a Fulbright scholarship. It was the year of the People Power Revolution. Filipinos were taking to streets to protest against the brutal regime of President Ferdinand Marcos. Democracy was restored after a period of 21 years. As with any political revolution, it didn’t leave untouched a young Ressa, who was studying broadcast journalism at the University of Philippines at the time. During that year, “she learned a ton about politics”.

Ressa became a journalist with CNN, then bureau chief in Jakarta and later Manila. She went on to become the head of ABS-CBN News, the largest TV network in the Philippines where she managed over a 1,000 journalists. Over the years, she has received numerous awards in journalism. Most recently, she has been bestowed with CPJ’s 2018 Gwen Ifill Press Freedom award, Knight International Journalism Award by ICFJ, and Golden Pen of Freedom Award by WAN-IFRA. She has authored two books, Seeds of Terror: An Eyewitness Account of Al-Qaeda’s Newest Center of Operations in South-East and From Bin Laden to Facebook.

Starting with just 12 reporters in 2011, Rappler is now been credited with being Philippines’ biggest, leanest and quickest source of digital news. Ressa and Rappler have been at the forefront of the fight against Duterte regime’s bloody war on drugs and depleting press freedom in Philippines. Over the last two years, Rappler has worked to investigate fake news stories and attacks on social media. Their research showed how Duterte’s election machinery which helped him win was now being used to attack its critics in media. Facebook is the primary source of news in Philippines, where smartphones outnumber people.

In 2016, Rappler invited all five presidential candidates to its forum, #TheLeaderIWant. Only Duterte, who was lagging behind in press coverage at that time, turned up for the forum. According to this Bloomberg report, the forum co-sponsored by Facebook “introduced Duterte to Filipino millennials on the platform where they live.”

Duterte’s successful campaign on social media propelled him to victory in May 2016. What started out as an election campaign strategy to attract and reach potential voters, soon turned into a weapon. According to a report in The Guardian, the social media election machinery was now being used to silence opponents who were speaking against his war on drugs. Things took an ugly turn when Ressa came into direct conflict with Duterte and he publicly declared “war on her journalists”.

In February 2017, the Philippines government started a probe into Rappler’s ownership structure. In January this year, the Securities and Exchange Commission revoked Rappler’s license, accusing it of circumventing constitutional restrictions on foreign ownership. Ressa reportedly said, “I’ve been a journalist for more than 33 years, and at Rappler we refuse to change, I refuse to be bullied”. Ressa seems to have won the first round in the battle for survival of Rappler. On July 30, a Court of Appeals said Rappler’s license revocation is wrong.

For folks at Rappler, “it is business as usual”.

Hear Maria Ressa talk about this struggle and what it means for Philippines’ democracy at The Media Rumble. Don’t miss her on the Patriotism vs Journalism panel and her one-on-one talk with Hartosh Singh Bal. For the second time, Newslaundry & Teamwork Arts come together to bring you the best of the news media industry. 

Register at themediarumble.com.

Date: August 3 & August 4 

Venue: India Habitat Centre, New Delhi.