The camp of Leyte Rep. Martin Romualdez is firing back hard at Peanut Gallery Media Network (PGMN) after the arrest of its founder, saying this isnโt journalism under attackโitโs an extortion case wearing a โfree speechโ costume. Romualdez spokesperson Atty. Elaine Atienza framed it bluntly: the real issue isnโt criticism or exposรฉs, itโs whether money was demanded in exchange for silence.
Atienzaโs line is simple: if you have evidence of wrongdoing, you release it and file itโyou donโt dangle it like a hostage. She claimed PGMN allegedly had material โready to runโ for weeks but chose not to publish it, supposedly using it as leverage instead. That, she argued, doesnโt just hurt Romualdezโit poisons public trust by blurring the line between real media work and โpay us or we post.โ
On the enforcement side, the NBI confirmed the arrest of PGMN founder Franco Mabanta and four others, citing alleged robbery/extortion tied to the Cybercrime Prevention Act. The NBIโs version: Mabanta had allegedly been attempting to shake down Romualdez since last year, with the supposed demand resurfacing recentlyโincluding claims of a teaser being sent and an amount that ballooned as high as โฑ350 million. After the arrest, the NBI said other officials have started approaching them about possible โblackmailingโ tooโhinting this might not be a one-off story.
PGMN, for its part, is calling the arrest a โsetupโ meant to silence them, insisting there was no extortion and no threats, and that only โone sideโ was shown. But Romualdezโs camp is pushing the case back to the ground: evidence beats narratives, and the courtsโnot social mediaโwill decide if this was legit watchdog work or a cash-for-silence operation.
Image from PGMN FB