14/06/2009

Much ado about almost nothing

CARLOS EDUARDO LINS DA SILVA
ombudsman@uol.com.br

The reaction of many news organizations, journalists and entities to the Petrobras blog was clearly unreasonable

Nobody needs to have read the Petrobras blog to understand problems in the story published on Saturday, June 6, about the company's relations with the MBC (Brazilian Competitive Movement).

This is how I expressed, in the daily critique I do for editions of this newspaper, my initial reaction when coming upon the teaser on the front page: "Frankly, I don't see relevance to the information that Petrobras' funding for the non-government organization in which its president is among the members of its board meriting placement on the front page."

My argument was that in general the presence of people who occupy prestigious positions on boards of organizations such as MBC is only symbolic. As the story itself reported, the president of Petrobras doesn't even participate in MBC meetings.

I concluded that "Petrobras' contracting at MBC could merit criticism, without formal complaints, for various reasons. But the fact that Dilma Rousseff (chief of staff to President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva) and José Sergio Gabrielli (Petrobras president) participate nominally on the board of ONG, no."

The publication of letters from the president of MBC and the head of public relations at Petrobras in "Letters to the Editor" on Monday confirmed my impressions and was sufficient for me (and many readers) to reach conclusions about the value of the matter.

Through the week, the relationship between Petrobras and MBC was left behind (what seems to confirm its low relevance) and the debate, unjustifiably hysterical, was concentrated on the creation of the Facts and Data blog by the state company.

Petrobras and any entity or citizen has an undeniable right to create blogs, sites, newspapers or publications of any type they want. If it wants to make public all the questions that it receives from journalists, there is nothing that stops that either legal or ethically (especially if you make it clear to those who contact this medium).

It makes no sense for Petrobras to try to edit content of news organizations. But there is no problem in making public material that would be cut during the process of editing by these organizations.

The reaction of many journalists, news organizations and entities to the initiative was clearly unreasonable. If someone were hurt by the decision to reveal the questions of journalists before publication of stories it would the company itself, as its retreat on this point made clear: if the exclusive guidelines stop being exclusive because the source reveals them to the public, it shows more of those who make them and don't hear from this source before publishing the story.

From this episode, the only thing to lament is that it threw more fuel on the fire of the sectarian conflict that poisons the national political environment, to the harm of everyone.

Like a thunderbolt on a day with blue skies at São Paulo University

Folha treated the strike at São Paulo University through Friday as a police story, isolated and lacking old and serious grievances. The newspaper ignored problems which have been confronted for years at universities in São Paulo.

The material published on Tuesday circled around the conflict. Could police enter the campus or not? Were they excessive in the confrontation or not? Will administrators resign or not?

Complaints by staff members, professors and students were not debated. Are they justified? Is it possible to meet them? Why are they striking? Readers do not receive minimally satisfactory information about these things.

The only text that touched on these topics was the opinion piece by José Arthur Giannotti on Thursday. He said that the budget for three universities in São Paulo is blocked by payments to retirees and workers and 85% of that at São Paulo University is payroll.

Despite the methodology of the opinion piece, news coverage did not check (or at least did not publish) anything about it, as should have been done for a long time. Nor did it deal with conditions at various factions of São Paulo University, which a reader said are divided between those who live in upscale and downscale neighborhoods.

To read

"Blablablogue," organized by Nelson de Oliveira, Terracotta Publishing, 2009 (25 reals, or US $12.80)

To see

"My Own Name," by Murilo Salles, with Leandra Leal, 2007

What Folha did right...

Peru
The newspaper does, even at a distance, good coverage about the ethnic crisis in that country

...and where it did badly

GDP
Wednesday's headline omits the most important news (drop in gross domestic product was less than expected); to the contrary of what it did in March, when the decline in Brazil's GDP was among the biggest in the world compared with other countries, but this time did not appear on the front page

Folhateen
The supplement confuses between eroticism and pornography; the photo on the front page is obviously in poor taste

Dilma
A story on Tuesday about compensation for Dilma Rousseff is extemporaneous; the "Fashion 1" seal on the photograph beside one by Rodrigo Santoro parading in Thursday's brief items has no journalistic justification

Pandemic
A headline on Friday is a new example of the reality of subservience to official sources and formality

Topics most commented during the week

1. Petrobras
2. Flight 447
3. University of São Paulo

Worth remembering
Cases that need to be looked at again

The tough anti-drunk driving law is a year old. Isn't it time for the newspaper to do a serious appraisal of the surveys about its consequences?

Who is letters to the editor?
Letters
from readers 55
from people in the news 6

Centimeters
from readers 433
from people in the news 101
*from June 6 to 12, 2009

-Translation by John Wright