"The revelation that an established journalist had taken advantage of a vulnerable 17-year-old would be a news story worthy of public discussion."
In 1995, an Islamic court sentenced a Filipino woman, Sarah Balabagan, to death by firing squad for killing her employer in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), who had tried to rape her. She was 16 at the time. The verdict triggered an international outcry and a defense campaign in several countries, as her case came to symbolize the ill treatment of domestic servants in Arab states—and came just a few months after another Filipino domestic worker, Flor Contemplacion, was hanged in Singapore after being convicted of murder.
The campaign to save Balabagan, which included the payment of blood money to the relatives of the victim, eventually succeeded, and in her third trial, the sentence was reduced to a year’s imprisonment and 100 strokes of the cane. She returned to the Philippines on Aug. 1, 1996, to a hero’s welcome.
Shortly after her release, Balabagan embarked on a career as a singer, but soon became pregnant after a brief affair. Balabagan never revealed the identity of the child’s father—until this week.
In a video posted on social media, Balabagan identified the father as an established radio and TV news anchor who had covered her ordeal in 1996. She said rumors that wrongly identified the father as an ambassador—now deceased—who helped her at the time, or the businessman who paid her blood money, caused her to set the record straight this week, 22 years later.
From all indications, the relationship had been mutual—even though Balabagan was only 17 at the time. She said, however, that the broadcaster had pressed her into silence.
“No matter what happens, neither of us will admit anything,” she quoted him as saying in Filipino. “I was 17 years old at the time and I believed him.”
At another point in her video message, Balabagan said she had just been released from prison. “Just imagine how vulnerable I was then. But I’m not justifying what I did,” she said.
Balabagan, who has since married and who now lives in the United States, apologized to the broadcaster’s wife and family, and said she has moved on, having forgiven the broadcaster who impregnated her so many years ago.
Curiously, neither the broadcaster nor the giant network he works for has issued a statement on Balabagan’s revelation. No denial. No apology. Nothing. In fact, a quick internet search has shown hardly any major news organization—including the Manila Standard—has bothered to carry the story, and the broadcaster in question was on the air again Monday, as if nothing happened.
In a more enlightened society, the revelation that an established journalist had taken advantage of a vulnerable 17-year-old would be a news story worthy of public discussion.
It would trigger calls for reform and a demand that the broadcaster in question and his network address his ethical misstep, no matter how long ago that was. It should speak to the continuing abuse of position that men in power have over women. It should also lead us to question why, under Philippine law, the age of consent is a mind-boggling low of 12, which must be a relief to sexual predators. The revelation offered by Balabagan should have triggered something—not more of the same complicit silence she endured for 22 years.
