In the first weeks of January, a group of independent media outlets was accused of allegedly receiving money from the UK Embassy to modify their editorial agendas and even contributing “to topple the Maduro government.” Efecto Cocuyo, El Pitazo, Caraota Digital and Radio Fe y Alegría were some of the outlets affected by criminalization.
Efecto Cocuyo responded to the allegations and claimed to exercise journalism “under ethical rigor and oriented to the right of societies to be informed.” Also, they insisted that they are independent. “No institution or entity conditions or intervenes in the editorial line.”
A study showed that the campaign against these media, where Efecto Cocuyo is repeatedly mentioned, began on Twitter through two accounts: @globovision and @madeleintlSUR, joined later by @cqc44 (username “caiga quien caiga”, which the Hoaxy observatory identifies as a bot) and then spread to other accounts.
That same investigation reported that on January 9, the user @Mippcivzla assumed the activity of the campaign, which was replicated by automated accounts (bots). This inorganic behavior influenced but had little impact on the formation of public opinion.
The co-founder and director of Efecto Cocuyo, Luz Mely Reyes, said that these defamations and grievances only seek to silence the independent media, the few sources of information available to the people. “This is not strange to a policy that pursues hegemony; in the case of the media, the last 20 years have witnessed the dismantling of one of the pillars of democracy which is the independent press.”
– What do you think is the reason for this campaign against media outlets like Efecto Cocuyo, El Pitazo, El Estímulo or Caraota Digital?
– I do not know exactly why, we can make a guess but there is no certainty. We assume that it is part of an attack strategy from the government media and the para-government media that aims to control the flow of information from the media not aligned with the government.
– What is para-governmental media?
– It is as if they were paramilitaries, but they are para-governmental. These are media that are supposedly private but participate in this type of aggression, or the outlets whose owners are unknown and engage in moves to misinform, attack, manipulate and misrepresent information.
– Globovisión used its image to highlight this alleged illegal financing from the United Kingdom. Have you felt threatened physically or in your integrity as a journalist?
– Of course, I have felt threatened. When they point fingers, show your face and accuse you of being a mercenary and acting against your country, anyone who is not in their right mind can feel entitled to attack you, not only government officials. We already know that there is a pattern against journalists, human rights activists. Even though I am a public person, showing my face along those lies is an attack and makes me feel vulnerable, exposed to risks that can range from physical attacks to reputational damage.
– Have you had to take additional measures to guarantee the work and integrity of journalists and all the people who work at Efecto Cocuyo after this campaign of injury against you?
– Yes, we have indeed taken measures that I cannot discuss in depth because my team can feel exposed. We insist a lot on a statement we issued that the State must guarantee the safety and integrity of our workers, and the workers of the press in general, in the face of these attacks.
– Have you denounced these aggression campaigns before national or international authorities? The accusations even come from accounts of the National Armed Forces on social media
– Regarding the National Armed Forces, the use of their emblems constitutes a threat from an armed component to civilians, and that is very serious. We made that clear before international organizations and before different bodies.
Among them the OAS Rapporteurship for Freedom of Expression, the mission of High Commissioner Michelle Bachelet in the country, and all international organizations for the protection and defense of journalists.
– One of the issues mentioned in the notes published by Globovisión, El Universal, and others, is that the agenda of outlets such as Efecto Cocuyo was influenced by the British embassy. What influences the journalistic agenda of Efecto Cocuyo?
– The founders of Efecto Cocuyo are three women journalists, and the promise we made and keep is that there is absolutely no one influencing the editorial line, not even ourselves because we believe in journalism at the service of the people. If we believe in journalism at the service of the people, we cannot allow any factor of power, be it government or private capital, to influence our line.
What I believe is, and this is a hypothesis, that some of the media that attacked us are used to lending their editorial line for certain interests and they assume that other people do so, and they do not understand what independent journalism is.
–Efecto Cocuyo has already suffered from computer attacks and restrictions on its web domains… How to reach and inform Venezuelans under these conditions?
–Efecto Cocuyo was born on Twitter in 2015 and a few weeks later we already had 18,000 followers. People get information through different ways, not only through the web, and we have different information products. We have a printable newsletter called Cocuyo 7, a PDF file in which we process information and distribute it. When one is in a situation like this, journalists understand that information cannot be distributed through one single channel.
However, we are among the 10 most visited news sites in Venezuela, people read us a lot from abroad as well. We must remember that many Venezuelans living abroad transmit information to Venezuelans inside the country.
-We understand that you have key topics in your editorial line such as migration
– That is right. We decided to invest resources and ideas on the topic of migration and now we have the Venezuela Migrante project. At some point, we also had the Vidas Borradas project, which focused on people who lost their lives to firearms and uncovered the pattern of violence that exists in Venezuela in general, not only in state security agencies. We also advocate on the issue of human rights.
-Do you think that this campaign against independent media such as Efecto Cocuyo and El Pitazo, according to which these outlets are receiving illegal funding, could be related to the criminalization of the work of non-governmental organizations?
– Yes, I think it is part of a pattern that has already been identified by the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. This pattern of defamation, stigmatization, fabrication of lies and judicial harassment has been applied against independent and small media and organizations that work in defense of human or humanitarian rights.
This is not strange to a policy that pursues hegemony; in the case of the media, the last 20 years have witnessed the dismantling of one of the pillars of democracy which is the independent press. Media outlets were gradually permeated, private newspapers were bought with funds of unknown origin, and the last trench is these small digital media on which there are two strategies. One is to set up these para-governmental media and the other is to attack their reputation, block them, and harass journalists and independent media so that the population does not have access to information. The objective of all these attacks on independent media is to prevent citizens from having reliable sources of information and leave on the air the outlets that abide by censorship or the media that only show one version of the facts.
– Exercising journalism in Venezuela is risky. Last year two journalists died, and several cases of physical and verbal attacks by public officials and political leaders were registered. – What is your take on the current times? Will the risks increase in 2021 or does the new year pose new challenges to inform the population?
– I think the risks are going to increase. This is a policy aimed at further controlling the flow of information according to the government’s vision of power. What is happening to us is not surprising, we often say that we are the last trench in terms of independent work so we expect more attacks.
Now, in the context of a government that is seeking to ease the tensions with the European Union and the United States regarding sanctions and international isolation, attacking independent media and journalists does not seem to be very useful for this purpose because Europe and the United States hold a very high concept of the independent press means and its importance for society.
These attacks are now visible and they do not help the government to improve its relations with these countries and neither do the call for dialogue and the incorporation of the different sectors to solve the country’s problems.
-Recently we saw how five workers from Azul Positivo were imprisoned for using resources that had been provided by the agencies. In your case, you were accused of receiving monetary support from an embassy. Do you think this could lead to criminal charges?
– Anything can happen in Venezuela, especially when it is based on lies. As this was a smear campaign, it will be up to them to prove their allegations, but of course, there is a high risk of prosecution and criminalization of any type of international cooperation.
I must say, we do not receive international cooperation funds for editorial work. We expect an investigation from the state agencies and we do not rule out the possibility of prosecution.
– Is Efecto Cocuyo inconvenient for both sides of power?
– Doing journalism, and doing independent journalism, implies raising your voice before the power. It implies being able to ask questions, I always say that in Venezuela they have even tried to confiscate our right to ask. Power has only one way of acting if it does not have counterweights; Simón Bolívar once said that power tends to corrupt and absolute power corrupts even more. If there are no checks and balances, the factors of power will believe they are almighty. Of course, independent media will be convenient for any factor of power that believes it is almighty; freedom of expression is inconvenient to them, especially in a country where the people require information and seek sources of information. And I am just talking about information, I have not even talked about opinion, which makes a lot of people inconvenient to the power.
Translated by José Rafael Medina
