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PARAGUAY
Press freedom has been buffeted by government
agencies, authorities and politicians who try to control what the media publish
and put up legal obstacles to prevent the publication of things that do not
suit their interests.
The most serious development since the last meeting is two laws that went into
effect in July that clearly restrict journalism. One of them, known as the "Transparency
in Government Law" (Law 1728), with harsh provisions to obstruct investigative
reporting has been dubbed the "Gag Law."
After domestic and international pressure, Congress and the executive branch
repealed the law on September 24. However, the legislator who drafted the law,
Rafael Filizzola, presented a substitute bill. This bill, called the law of
"free access to public information," now being studied in the Congress,
has equally restrictive provisions.
Also on July 16, the date that President Luis Gonzalez Macchi promulgated Law
1728 "On Administrative Transparency," an equally damaging law for
press freedom went into effect - No. 1682, "regulating private information."
The law was promulgated on Jan. 16, but it did not take effect for six months,
which coincided with the date the "gag law" went into effect.
Among other things, Law 1628 prohibits making public "sensitive" information
about people and restricts publication of information about their assets, which
in the opinion of analysts in the press is appropriate in the cases of officials
who enrich themselves illicitly.
On September 5, the legislative committee of the Chamber of Deputies proposed
a change in the law, suggesting the following amendment in the first article:
"The law will not be applied, in any case, to databases or to sources of
journalistic information nor to the freedom to express opinion or to inform."
Legislators said that this amendment could prevent restrictions on the press,
but, as the distinguished Paraguayan jurist Alejandro Encina Marín said,
"the best law to regulate the right to information is no law at all."
Meanwhile, the courts are still being used to try to intimidate the press that
criticizes the government. Many politicians, government officials and private
parties filed lawsuits against editors and journalists, and, in some cases,
the journalists were punished.
For example, Judge Hugo López fined the editor of ABC Color the equivalent
of $120,000 in a lawsuit for libel and defamation brought by Sen. Juan Carlos
Galaverna of the ruling Colorado Party.
The columnist Ricardo Canese whose articles are published in ABC Color, was
ordered by the Supreme Court to serve two months in jail and pay a $650 fine
in a lawsuit for libel and defamation based on articles about the origin of
the fortune of presidential candidate Juan Carlos Wasmosy, who was elected,
written during the presidential campaign in 1992. Canese was also a presidential
candidate.
April was the 10th anniversary of the murder of journalist Santiago Leguizamón,
news director of the radio station Mburucuyá of Pedro Juan Caballero,
550 kilometers northeast of Asunción, and correspondent of the newspaper
Noticias in the same city. The crime has not been solved. Leguizamón
was shot because he was reporting about a criminal organization in that city
on the Brazilian border.
Since the last meeting, there have been attacks and threats against journalists
in the course of their work.
Following are specific cases of violations of press freedom.
On March 21, Antonio Mieres filed a lawsuit for libel and defamation against
the editor of the newspaper ABC Color, Aldo Zuccolillo because of an article
that mentioned Mieres as the intermediary of a suspicious $500 million credit
guaranteed with bonds from the national Treasury. In addition, the article said
that Mieres had served five prison terms for fraud. The trial is continuing.
On April 30, Electoral Judge Jorge Rolón Luna rejected a petition for
constitutional relief presented by Reinaldo Domínguez Dibb against the
newspaper Noticias. Domínguez Dibb, who was running for mayor of Asunción,
asked the judge to prohibit the newspaper from publishing a photograph that
he thought held him up to public ridicule.
On April 30, Judge López, fined the editor of ABC Color 470,880,000 guaranis
($120,000 at the exchange rate at that time) in a lawsuit for defamation and
libel filed by Galaverna. The judge said that the editor of ABC Color published
articles that "damaged Galaverna's good name," such as when the newspaper
quoted the late Vice President Luis María Argaña as calling Galaverna
a "cookie thief."
ABC Color also reported that Galaverna stayed at the Hotel Guaraní, property
of a government agency, without paying. The verdict was appealed and the case
is still in court.
On May 30, Judge López decided to acquit the editor of ABC Color in two
other cases involving articles in the newspaper.
One was filed by criminal judge Jorge Bogarín for an alleged attempt
to
interfere in a criminal investigation. The judge was upset by articles in ABC
Color that demonstrated that witnesses in the case of the murder of Vice President
Argaña on March 23, 1999, were not credible. Judge López acquitted
the editor of ABC Color when it was proved that the article cited by Bogarín
had been published before the judge declared the investigation secret.
The other lawsuit, for alleged instigation of false testimony, was brought by
Gumersindo Aguilar, a false witness who came forward in the assassination case
who was exposed by an investigation by the newspaper's reporters. The judge
proved that Aguilar's allegations were false.
On May 10, Judge Bogarín barred journalists from an open trial for sexual
coercion in which the victim was a minor.
On May 14, Sever del Puerto, journalist of the radio station Cáritas,
reported to a criminal prosecutor's office that the then Interior Minister Walter
Bower was the mastermind of a gang that pulled off the "mega-crime"
robbery of more than $11.2 million that was being transported in the international
airport of Asunción from an armored car to an airplane en route to banks
in the United States. He accused the same gang of responsibility for other robberies
in Asunción and other parts of the country.
The journalist later reported threats and pressures, and he and his family received
police protection by judicial order and also received support from press organizations
in Paraguay and abroad.
On May 31, Oscar Isidro González, former legislator for the ruling Colorado
Party, filed a suit for defamation and libel against the editor of ABC Color,
Aldo Zuccolillo, because of the publication of a photograph of him with a bundle
of identity cards during internal party elections. Holding on to identity cards
is a way to buy votes, which is illegal. This case is continuing in the courts.
On June 5, unknown persons on a pickup truck with tinted windows shot at the
building of the Multimedia company which publishes the newspaper Popular. No
one was hurt, and the motive of the attack was not known.
On July 16 reporter Mina Feliciángeli of Radio Uno, received a threatening
note saying, "not even Mandrake will save you." The anonymous note
accused Feliciángeli of collaborating with the government that took power
after the assassination of Argaña and the death of seven young protesters.
An investigation uncovered the names of the people who sent the note. They apologized
to the reporter and asked her not to take legal action against them.
On July 20, Andrés Pereira, a photographer for the newspaper Vanguardia
of Ciudad del Este, 330 kilometers east of Asunción, was attacked by
plainclothes police officers who were hitting a handcuffed prisoner in the bed
of a pickup truck. The police officers took away Pereira's camera and kept the
film.
On August 4, Judge Antonio Ocampos acquitted the editor of the newspaper Noticias,
Eduardo Nicolás Bo Peña in a lawsuit for libel brought by Richard
Gómez who had been named in the newspaper as one of the people responsible
for Argaña's assassination. Gómez was acquitted by Judge Bogarín
who found no incriminating evidence against him.
Judge Ocampos acquitted the editor of responsibility, because he said in a report
presented to the court by his lawyer that four journalists were responsible
for the investigation that produced the article with the headline "Richard
Gómez Is the Third Hit Man in the Assassination of Vice President Argaña."
On August 14 Richard Gómez appealed the acquittal of Bo Peña.
On August 6, the attorney general of the nation, Oscar Latorre, confirmed the
request for a 25-year prison term for Milciades Maylín, the alleged killer
of journalist Salvador Medina, former news director of community radio station
Ñemity of Capiibary, 350 kilometers northeast of Asunción.
Latorre also supported the provisional acquittal of the other defendants, ordered
by a judge, saying the investigation did not have enough evidence "to support
accusing those people."
Relatives of the victim expressed their disagreement with the acquittal of the
other suspects-Timoteo Cáceres, Daniel Enciso and Luis Alberto Franco-and
appealed.
On August 24, lawyer Alcides Martínez filed a criminal complaint against
Rafael Macial Montiel, correspondent of ABC Color in San Juan Bautista (Misiones),
250 kilometers south of Asunción; Celso Rivarola, correspondent of the
newspaper La Nación; Sixta Ferreira de Gómez, news director of
the radio station Espectator; Roberto Saccarello and Carlos Llano of Televisión
Sanjuanina, all of the same town, because of coverage of a demonstration against
the deposed governor of Misiones province, Egidio Ruiz Pérez. The complaint
was brought because of an alleged "punishable action against the security
of people's daily life" and the case is continuing in the courts.
On August 27, Judge Bogarín acquitted the editor of Noticias, Eduardo
Nicolás Bo Peña in a complaint for alleged libel and defamation
brought by businessman Reinaldo Domínguez Dibb. The lawsuit was based
on an article in Noticias with the headline, "State Vehicles at the Service
of Friends," referring to the use of trucks of the Public Works Ministry
at Monte Alto farm, said to be owned by Domínguez Dibb.
The verdict that absolved the editor of Noticias said the purpose of the article
was defense of the public interest and there was no criminal intent.
One development considered very serious for the practice of journalism was the
verdict of Judge Juan Pablo Cardozo of Concepción, 220 miles north of
Asunción, on September 21. He ordered a local journalist who mentioned
an official report mentioning administrative wrongdoing in the city hall to
pay a fine.
The journalist is the correspondent of ABC Color in Concepción Telmo
Tomás Ibáñez who referred in a signed commentary to a report
by the government accounting office about wrongdoing involving the mayor and
some city council members.
Even though the journalist's opinions were supported by the official report,
it was speculated on good authority that he would be given a severe sentence
because of the close relationship between the judge and the municipal authorities
in question.
The sentence, a fine of $2,500, was considered an attempt at intimidation to
prevent negative reports about state officials. Ibañez's lawyer appealed
the verdict. On September 28, Judge López acquitted of guilt and punishment
Aldo Zuccolillo, editor of ABC Color, in the lawsuit for defamation and libel
brought by Marta Barcilicia Vázquez. She felt injured when a picture
of her young daughter, was used to illustrate an interview with Juvenile Prosecutor
Sandra Farías about the serious problem of child prostitution.
The newspaper La Nación and the radio station LA 9.70 AM have again been
threatened by former president Juan Carlos Wasmosy.
These threats were made after a series of articles in La Nación about
secret accounts in the Cayman Islands that mention a great increase in Wasmosy's
assets during his presidential term.
Wasmosy systematically persecuted La Nación when he was president and
try to silence the newspapers reports about corruption. The pressures even included
prohibition of placing government advertising in La Nación.
After the recent series of investigative articles about a secret bank account
in the Cayman Islands, Wasmosy said in radio interviews that he would take over
"the newspaper and the radio station." He said the articles were published
as "Alejandro's revenge," because he had "arrested his father,
the newspaper owner," Osvaldo Domínguez Dibb.
Currently, a prosecutor is investigating Wasmosy's secret accounts because of
the articles in La Nación.
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Copyright © 2003 Inter American Press Association.
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