Philippinische Medien: Ein Kampf um Freiheit

Horacio “Howie” Severino has been a journalist for nearly 40 years, and has produced over 200 TV documentaries, at least a dozen of which have won domestic and international awards. He is in his 23rd year as a TV documentarist for I-Witness, one of the longest-running television shows in the Philippines. He is also a pioneering podcast host for GMA Integrated News. He anchored the morning news at GMA News TV for eight years. From 2009 to 2014, he was editor-in-chief of GMA News Online. In other stages of his career, he was a newspaper reporter and magazine editor. He is a co-founder of the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism. He retired in 2021 as a Vice President of GMA Network, responsible for the training of its journalists. His documentaries have covered many heritage-related themes, which has led him to become an advocate and teacher of Baybayin, the ancient Filipino script. He has produced five documentaries on Jose Rizal, which have been used widely in classrooms across the Philippines. Howie was born in Manila but spent a large part of his youth in the United States as a diplomat’s son, and graduated from Tufts University in the US with a degree in History, magna cum laude. He received his MA degree in Environmental Policy from Sussex University in the UK. His documentary on being an early Covid survivor, “Ako si Patient 2828,” won Best Documentary in the Philippines’ Gawad Tanglaw awards and became one of the most watched Philippine documentaries of all time. In 2023, he was given the prestigious Balagtas literary award for his writings by the Unyon ng mga Manunulat ng Pilipinas (UMPIL).

Roby Alampay is a distinguished Filipino journalist, media executive, and advocate for press freedom, with a career spanning over three decades. He is the founder and chairman of Puma Public Productions, the pioneering force behind PumaPodcast, Southeast Asia’s first non-music audio production company. Under his leadership, PumaPodcast has garnered international recognition, including inclusion in the US Library of Congress Podcast Preservation Project and accolades from the Society of Publishers in Asia and the Human Rights Press Awards.​ Alampay’s journalism journey began in print media, where he played a pivotal role in establishing TV5’s online news portal and served as editor-in-chief of BusinessWorld, the Philippines’ oldest business daily. His tenure was marked by a successful digital transformation and financial turnaround of the publication. He also anchored the nightly newscast “The Big Story” and co-anchored “The Chiefs” on Cignal TV.​ Beyond broadcasting, Alampay has been a prominent figure in media development and advocacy. He was the first executive director of the Southeast Asian Press Alliance (SEAPA) and currently serves as the Asia Regional Adviser for International Media Support (IMS), focusing on strengthening independent media across the region.​ In 2025, Alampay took on a new leadership role as Vice President for Communications at PLDT Inc., reflecting his continued influence in shaping media and communication strategies in the Philippines.​ An alumnus of the University of the Philippines and Columbia University’s Graduate School of Journalism, Alampay’s career reflects a deep commitment to journalistic excellence and media innovation.

Patricia Evangelista is a trauma journalist and former investigative reporter for the Philippine news company Rappler. Her debut book, Some People Need Killing: A Memoir of Murder in My Country, an account of the Philippine drug war, was hailed as “a journalistic masterpiece” by the New Yorker.

The book, released October 2023 by Random House, was a New York Times Top 10 Best Books of the Year, A New Yorker and The Economist Best Book of the Year, and was Time Magazine’s #1 Nonfiction Book of the Year. It has since won the NYPL Helen Bernstein Book Award and was longlisted for the Moore Prize for Human Rights and the PEN Galbraith Award. She lives in Manila.