Philippines court acquits Nobel laureate, media group of tax evasion charges

Criminal case of tax evasion was filed during previous Duterte administration, which Rappler.com says was ‘politicized’

By Riyaz ul Khaliq

ISTANBUL (AA) – A Philippines court on Wednesday acquitted a Nobel laureate journalist and a media group of tax evasion charges.

“Today, we celebrate the triumph of facts over politics,” Rappler.com said in a statement after the verdict announced by the First Division of the Philippine Court of Tax Appeals (CTA) in the tax evasion case against journalist Maria Ressa and Rappler Holdings Corp. (RHC).

Maria won the Nobel Peace Prize in 2021.

The case against the journalist and the media group was filed by the previous Rodrigo Duterte government.

“We thank the court for this just decision and for recognizing that the fraudulent, false, and flimsy charges made by the Bureau of Internal Revenue (BIR) do not have any basis in fact. An adverse decision would have had far-reaching repercussions on both the press and the capital markets,” the media group stated.

It accused the previous government of a “politicized BIR under the Duterte administration (that) deliberately ignored evidence that ran counter to its false conclusions that Rappler Holdings was a dealer in securities, made a profit from raising capital, and failed to pay the proper taxes from these supposed earnings.”

The case was filed in Jan. 2018, and documents were sought from Rappler on March 5 the same year after the tax evasion complaint against the journalist and the media group was announced.

Later, the BIR and the Philippines Department of Justice (DOJ) filed criminal cases against them.

“This is brazen harassment and abuse of power. How many more companies, businesses, and even private individuals have been subjected to this kind of harassment and unethical conduct of government officials and agencies? How many have been victimized and what recourse do they have?” the media group asked.

“Rappler will continue to dream big and explore what technology can offer. This is what fired our vision when RHC sought to increase capital and grow the business through Philippine Depositary Receipts in 2015. We believed then, as we do now, that journalism, technology, and empowered communities will be the guardrails of any democracy.

“Maria Ressa and RHC may have won today. But so did the ordinary taxpayer and businessman being unjustly harassed by the BIR,” the statement added.

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