Lean Rey Francisco is almost 3 years old, but unlike many kids his age, he cannot play, walk, crawl, nor sit up. His malnourishment is so severe that the simple task of rolling over requires tremendous effort from the child. His grandmother is the only adult taking care of him and his two other siblings in Pasacao, Camarines Sur.

I-WITNESS tells his story this Monday.

Lean has never tasted milk from his mother and instead drank rice coffee for most of his 3 years. In Pasacao, 80% of the children weighed were severely malnourished and all of them are coffee drinkers. Because of poverty, most people in Pasacao believe that coffee is enough to feed a child. But how much nutritional value does coffee really have?
What happened to Lean? Kara David’s search for answers takes her to Bulacan in search of Lean’s mother, then to Manila where medical records show Lean was once a healthy baby. As the child’s history unfolds, Kara discovers how coffee became a great determinant of Lean’s condition.

I-WITNESS airs this Monday, after Saksi, only on GMA Network.

‘Kape Para Kay Lean’ on I-Witness this Monday originally appeared on Starmometer on September 18, 2010.

Pablito is already 18 years old. Yet he cannot walk, eat, or bathe alone. His bones are brittle; too brittle in fact, that one wrong move would cause them to break. He’s had fractures all over his body.

But whatever pain his broken bones may bring is soothed by the loyalty of his number one champion – his brother Jason. Everyday, Jason lifts Pablito on his back to take him to a school for persons with disabilities. Pablito may have brittle bones, but with Jason’s dedication, he has a strong chance at a decent future. Jason says he has never thought of Pablito as a burden. He will carry him day after day, towards a better life.

Pablito and Jason are only some of the characters in “Pasan-Pasan,” a moving documentary about commitment and no-surrender. Witness how families carry each other through the good and the bad, in a story that will change the way people define the word “burden.”

I-WITNESS airs every Monday, after Saksi, on GMA Network.

Families Carrying Each Other Through Good and Bad in I-WITNESS’ ‘Pasan-Pasan’ originally appeared on Starmometer on July 3, 2010.

Philippine elections are riddled with mudslinging, character assassinations, and white paper distribution. For most campaign strategists, this is just regular fare. Black propaganda, however, is not a simple undertaking. It’s a covert, complicated, and sometimes dangerous operation. This Monday, after Saksi on GMA Network, I-WITNESS explores black propaganda.

A candidate’s sin from the past may resurrect many years later. Half-truths or totally false stories may appear in text blasts. With the advent of new technology, the fine line between what is true and what is bogus is getting thinner and thinner. With the Internet, especially the social networking sites, it’s now easy for people to spread gossip as legitimate news.

This Monday, Sandra Aguinaldo explores the dark and complex business of black propaganda in the Philippines. Clandestine operations are exposed and secrets will be revealed. A week before the elections, viewers can arm themselves with the knowledge they need to help them make an informed choice.

I-WITNESS ‘ Black Propaganda airs this Monday, May 3, after Saksi on GMA Network!

I-Witness Tackles Black Propaganda this Monday originally appeared on Starmometer on May 2, 2010.

The journey of the sick and injured from a poor Mangyan town in Oriental Mindoro to immediate medical care is steep, muddy, and often harrowing; as their worried families back home face more hardships in the horizon.

This is the subject of “Ambulansiyang de Paa,” the I-Witness episode that recently won the prestigious George Foster Peabody Award—the oldest honor in electronic media. I-Witness (which airs every Monday after Saksi) is among the 36 critically-acclaimed programs all over the world that were chosen to receive the honor, which is now on its 69th year.

“Condemning deplorable conditions while celebrating neighborly valor and ingenuity, the report shows how people in a poor village carry their sick and injured over dangerous terrain to distant medical care using ‘ambulances on foot,’” the Peabody Awards site states.

Hosted by Kara David, “Ambulansiyang de Paa” showed how residents of a poor Mangyan community of Apnagan in upland Oriental Mindoro transport their sick and injured to medical care. It aired March 2009.

In the episode, Kara met several residents of the community who walk the line between life and death. One of them is Lowen Tayo, who has tuberculosis. Despite the relative ease of curing TB now, Lowen’s sickness has worsened due to the town’s lack of medical facilities. Just as badly situated are John Lloyd and Wendy. John Lloyd has broncho-pneumonia and hernia, while Wendy has severe burns all over her body.

Since the hospital is a long way from their community, one can only wonder how their conditions may be remedied. The “Ambulance-On-Foot” or “Ambulansiya de Paa” appears to be these people’s only recourse. The patients are brought to the nearest health facility on foot by their neighbors and loved ones using only woven hammocks.

Director Nowell Cuanang, shares that shooting in such a remote, rugged place was an enlightening experience.

“I almost fell off a cliff, almost got bitten by a snake. But we were touched by the Mangyans. Despite their conditions, they weren’t complaining, and were always smiling… Their foot ambulance required unity and team work. It was a triumph of the human spirit,” he says.

“It hasn’t sunk in,” host Kara David says of “Ambulansiyang de Paa” winning the Peabody. While happy, she also admitted to feeling guilty about winning an award when “there has been little change” in the subject of her documentary. A year after the documentary aired, she said there is still no health center in the barangay.

Executive producer Angel Directo adds, “More than the honor this award brings, we hope that this will draw more attention to the plight of those without proper health care in the country so that their conditions may finally improve.”

Other members of the award-winning I-Witness team are former program manager Kristoffer Brugada, executive producer Lloyd Navera, cameraman Disney Carreon, assistant cameraman Aldrin Lacson, and researcher Wilma Sesaldo.

This is the second time that the Kapuso Network was recognized by the Peabody Awards. In 1999, the documentaries “Kidneys for Sale” and “Kamao” by Jessica Soho and her I-Witness team and Jay Taruc‘s child labor story on Brigada Siete brought home the country’s first ever Peabody.

“Winning the Peabody for the second time is a great honor and blessing for GMA News and Public Affairs and the Philippines,” GMA Network’s Senior Vice President for News and Public Affairs Marissa Flores said. “We are inspired to do even better.”

The 69th Annual Peabody Awards ceremony will be held on May 17, 2010 at the Waldorf-Astoria in New York City. It will be hosted by Diane Sawyer, the award-winning anchor of ABC’s World News.

I-Witness’ ‘Ambulansiyang de Paa’ Will be Honored at the 69th Peabody Awards originally appeared on Starmometer on April 19, 2010.

In the name of beauty, Kristine Madrigal has spent a fortune on surgery to his nose, cheeks, chin, breasts, hips, and knees.

Now all Kristine needs is one final operation to become a full-fledged woman.

For years, Kristine has thought about and agonized over the decision to have his penis removed and a vagina installed, or sex reassignment surgery. Howie Severino and his I-Witness team accompanied him on the last several months of this journey to womanhood. Kristine’s quest is uncommon, but the desire to shape his destiny is not, in an age when one’s identity is no longer simply a matter of fate but how much one believes in the power of transformation.

Along the way, Howie and his team meet other “transpinays” who offer hints of Kristine’s possible future: Barbie, who is happily married as a woman; and Eddie, who lost both his sex drive and his lover after losing his penis.

Before the final decision, Kristine must undergo a psychological test to determine if he is truly prepared for the irreversible operation.

Kristine’s fate is revealed on Monday night, the final episode of I-Witness’s anniversary month in its 10th anniversary year. Catch I-Witness after Saksi on GMA Network.

Howie Severino Features ‘TransPinay’ on I-Witness originally appeared on Starmometer on November 28, 2009.

During the 1990s, documentaries were an unheard of genre in the Philippine broadcast industry. The usual melodramas, talk shows and news magazine programs dominated the airwaves, raking in ratings and awards for TV networks.

Before the decade ended, GMA News and Public Affairs thought it was already time to produce a weekly documentary show. On January 18, 1999, I-Witness, the country’s first documentary series, aired on Philippine television.

However, before I-Witness even aired, its one-topic presentation and style of storytelling was deemed too slow and boring. Some even said that Filipino viewers were not yet ready for this kind of program.

I-Witness proved them all wrong.

After more than 500 documentaries, I-Witness is now the country’s longest-running late night program still airing. It has already received numerous recognitions from both local and international award-giving bodies, including the Philippines’ first ever George Foster Peabody Award, Gold and Silver World Medals from the New York Festivals, the Asia-Pacific Child Rights Awards and the Asian TV Awards, among others.

I-Witness also prides itself with having once had as its hosts many of the finest journalists and broadcasters in media including Jessica Soho and Mike Enriquez. Following their footsteps today are GMA Network’s most experienced senior journalists, namely Howie Severino, Kara David, Sandra Aguinaldo and Jay Taruc. Every Monday, these award-winning documentarists give viewers a new way of looking at and understanding the world we live in.

“I-Witness has made documentaries a part of mainstream television, and inspired similar formats for other shows. It has inspired many to aspire to make documentaries and tell their own stories, because our show has demonstrated what a powerful medium the documentary is,” Howie relates.

For Howie, I-Witness is his “outlet and creative space for non-fiction stories that need time to be produced and air time to be told. It has made my career deeply satisfying. ”

The word “innovation” has been attached to I-Witness since its inception. Through the years, the program has introduced new techniques in video presentation and used fresh styles of storytelling, sometimes even bordering into the “avant garde.”

“I-Witness is not called television’s finest hour for nothing.” Sandra Aguinaldo explains. “I can say every episode is one step towards excellence since we are constantly challenged by management to set the pace for late-night shows and always be creative in presenting our reports to the people.”

Howie added that compared to other public affairs shows, I-Witness gives them more creative freedom in producing stories. “Most of our episodes don’t even have spiels by the hosts and go straight into the story, like most classically done documentaries. That alone makes I-Witness unique among public affairs shows where hosts introduce and end each show with on-camera spiels. We are not required to do that.”

Because of its radical approach to documentary production, I-Witness has always been a talk-of-the-town after each airing, sometimes even irking the attention of the censors. Howie’s documentary Lukayo, which is “a dance by old women dressed like clowns and wielding phallic symbols in Laguna, got the program suspended by the MTRCB, simply because the censors deemed an age-old tradition practiced by grandmothers to be obscene, along with other fertility rituals from around the country.” Instances like this, however, do not stop the program in producing ground-breaking documentaries.

“I-Witness has become bolder and more ambitious in its subject matter, sometimes testing the limits set by government regulators. It aspires to lead in building a documentary movement in the Philippines by organizing documentary festivals with free screenings in popular theaters, sponsoring student documentary competitions, conducting annual seminars as well as more frequent talks and screenings on campuses, and by setting an example with its own work, often using small camera equipment similar to what ordinary, non-professional producers can use,” adds Howie.

Lives have changed, laws have been created, and viewers were compelled to act. More than the awards and innovations, the impact and influence that I-Witness has made to its viewers and case studies is what makes it a stand out among late-night public affairs programs in the Philippines. Laws on organ donation, for example, were approved in Congress because of Jessica Soho’s Kidneys for Sale. Kara David’s “Gamu-gamo sa Dilim” paved way to the installment of solar panels in Little Baguio, a small town devoid of electricity in Oriental Mindoro. Many of the case studies featured in I-Witness were given financial aids and scholarships by viewers.

Kara David, widely known for her documentaries about children, attests to the privilege of giving service to the public that I-Witness carries. “I’ve always believed that the role of I-Witness is to give viewers a new pair of eyes with which to see the world. Through the show, I have found my lifetime advocacy as a journalist — to use my medium as an instrument of empathy, an instrument to instill compassion to the powerless and voiceless. I-Witness not only opened the eyes of many viewers to the realities of life, but it also awakened their compassion, iyung malasakit na matagal nang nahihimlay sa kanilang puso. Because of I-Witness, I have started a small scholarship project for poor but deserving children, at plano kong palawakin pa ito in the future to become a legitimate foundation. I feel I became a better Filipino because of the program.”

This Novermber, I-Witness will celebrate its 10th anniversary with four special documentaries that are expected to change the broadcasting landscape. This time, I-Witness will air documentaries that were produced over a longer period of time than any other series of documentaries done for any TV program in the Philippines.

“As early as April of this year, we have been shooting for the anniversary episodes–something that we don’t usually do, or any other late night television programs have done, for that matter. The more time you spend in producing your story, the closer you get to the truth, and with these documentaries, we hope to bring out the truth in our specific topics,” reveals Jay Taruc, who starts the anniversary month on November 9 with his documentary “Kristo,” a graphic feature about the Senakulo, or the dramatic presentation of the Passion of the Christ in Cutud, Pampanga. Jay discovers that the person who presently plays “Christ” is quitting his oath next year. However, residents and officers are opposing the move to pass on the title because the town’s supposed successor is a self-admitted gambler and drunkard.

Sandra Aguinaldo’s anniversary episode airs next on November 16. Her documentary “Bigatin” tackles the growing problem of obesity in the Philippines. Sandra follows the plight of two obese women and documents their struggle to bring their weight down through various ways of weight reduction. Sandra joins them in their fight as she subjects herself to arduous exercises and strict diets in order to prepare herself for pregnancy.

On November 23, Kara David delivers the third installment of the anniversary celebration with a follow-up documentary on pediatric tuberculosis. Kara revisits her case studies in “Hingalo ng Bunso,” an I-Witness episode she produced a few months ago, and reveals whether or not their conditions improved after their stories were aired on the program.

Ending the anniversary month on November 30 is Howie Severino’s remarkable documentary about a transsexual’s journey to realizing her dreams of becoming a woman. Howie documents how Vincent Christar Ibardolaza, a.k.a. Plates, pulls all strings in order to become a “Trans-Pinay.” However, Plates still needs to pass a battery of tests which will determine if she is mentally and emotionally prepared to undergo the sex reassignment operation.

Join Sandra, Kara, Jay and Howie as they celebrate ten fruitful years of ground-breaking documentaries on I-Witness, airing on four Mondays of November over GMA, after the late night newscast Saksi.

I-Witness is Now on its 10th Year originally appeared on Starmometer on November 6, 2009.

Reporter’s Notebook’s “Lunok-Droga” (Filipino Drug Mules) won the Silver Screen Award in the Social Issues Production-Documentary Category.

The documentary is hosted by Jiggy Manicad who traveled to Kuala Lumpur to witness the sting operation jointly conducted by Philippine and Malaysian policemen to arrest members of a Nigerian drug syndicate.

Another Reporter’s Notebook documentary, “Pinays for Export” received a Certificate for Creative Excellence in the same category. The episode featured the human trafficking of Filipino women not just in the Philippines but to the neighboring countries as well such as Malaysia, Hong Kong and Macau.

And finally, Jay Taruc’s documentary “Batang Langoy” (Child Swimmers) won for I-Witness a Certificate for Creative Excellence also in the Social Issues category.

It documented the struggle of the Magalumbi island children, who swim a two-kilometer stretch everyday just to be able to go to school.

Last year, GMA 7 brought home 7 awards from the prestigious award-winning body which was founded in 1967 and is one of the world’s leading international events devoted exclusively to recognition of outstanding documentaries among others.

GMA Wins 3 Awards in US International Film and Video Festival 2009 originally appeared on Starmometer on June 5, 2009.