(PROBIDAD/IFEX) – The following is an abridged version of a 23 June 2005 PROBIDAD alert: Journalists Eduardo Maldonado and Esdras Amado López are facing a defamation complaint filed against them by the La Constancia savings and loan institution (Asociación de Ahorro y Préstamo La Constancia) for reporting on funding it received from the main pension […]
(PROBIDAD/IFEX) – The following is an abridged version of a 23 June 2005 PROBIDAD alert:
Journalists Eduardo Maldonado and Esdras Amado López are facing a defamation complaint filed against them by the La Constancia savings and loan institution (Asociación de Ahorro y Préstamo La Constancia) for reporting on funding it received from the main pension fund for the country’s government employees.
Maldonado is the director of the “Hable como Habla” television programme, broadcast on Channel 11, and “Interpretando la noticia”, a Globo radio programme rebroadcast live on Channel 66. López is the director of the “Así se Informa” programme, broadcast on Channel 36, of which he is a co-owner. The journalists have been summoned to a conciliation hearing scheduled for 19 July 2005 in the capital, Tegucigalpa. If no agreement between the parties is reached at that time, the case will then go to trial.
Maldonado told the Committee for Free Expression (Comité por la Libre Expresión, C-Libre) that the legal action is an attempt to intimidate the press and to limit freedom of expression. “We are looking into the complaint. I do not want to become a martyr, but I also do not want to give in to pressures to silence me. We are going to the hearing with the best justification possible, but we believe there are powerful sectors seeking to intimidate journalists. Several colleagues have already been taken to court,” he added. López said he refused to be intimidated and that he would attend the hearing.
La Constancia’s lawyer Antonio Ocampo Santos has accused the journalists of sowing panic among the institution’s account holders.
On 15 April, La Constancia received 300 million lempiras (approx. US$15.7 million) from the main pension fund for the country’s government employees (Instituto de Jubilaciones y Pensiones de los Empleados Públicos, INJUPEM), to finance personal loans to current and retired public servants and officials. Jhony Kafatti, a special advisor to the government with cabinet minister level ranking, is La Constancia’s principal shareholder.
On 9 May, Maldonado and López reported on the transaction, alleging that President Ricardo Maduro’s government did a great number of “favours” for its friends, and that the government was doing a “favour” for La Constancia at a moment when the institution was widely perceived to be in trouble.
According to Ocampo, La Constancia account holders subsequently thronged into the financial institution’s branches to withdraw their savings, a move which the Bank and Securities Commission (Comisión de Banca y Seguros) put a break on.
Ocampo also accuses the journalists of having “incited hatred” when they allowed members of the public to comment on the La Constancia case on air during their programmes.
