The Data Protection Policy has generated an important debate in the journalistic class due to the impact of these measures if they are put into practice, as instructed by the Judiciary.
The general rule is that any information that makes the accused, victims, complainants, witnesses and auxiliaries identifiable will be omitted from the sentences that are posted on the institution’s web portal or delivered to third parties, including the names of the parties to the case. process will be the initial letters.
The president of the Dominican Newspaper Society (SDD), Persio Maldonado, considered that this reservation of information could generate restrictions that would impact the citizen’s right to free access to public information.
“This would produce a clash with freedom of expression and the exercise of journalism,” he stated, advocating for objective legislation that clearly delimits these aspects.
Aurelio Henríquez, president of the Dominican College of Journalists (CDP), agreed with Maldonado’s position.
“We agree that if a policy of cutting off or deleting relevant data in a sentence is applied, it violates the right to inform that journalists have to offer complete, verified and contrasted information,” he stressed.
The president of the National Union of Press Workers (SNTP), José Beato, considered that omitting the name of a person convicted of a crime promotes subjectivity and endangers the objectivity and veracity with which news events should be reported.
“You cannot erase the historical memory of a process because it loses the principle of publicity. The trials are public, oral and adversarial, with that policy there is no way that a trial can be public,” Beato said.
“Journalists cannot provide information without data,” he criticized.
The dilemma between reservation and access to information
In this sense, Maldonado stressed the need to distinguish between the confidential handling of investigations and access to information on open cases: “We have to distinguish here what would be the reservation that makes the entire investigation until it is confirmed and what is It is the right to information about known cases or those that are open in the process of becoming known,” he explained.
In the provision, in addition to the identification data, the financial, employment and health information of the employees may be omitted. processed.
The president of the SNTP said that he will hold an urgent meeting with the different unions, in order to analyze and socialize the scope of this policy that “threatens to eliminate data journalism.” The CDP does not rule out appealing to the Constitutional Court.
