Facebook flags Leyte Normal University campus paper page for ‘impersonation’

CEBU, Philippines – Student journalists of An Lantawan, the campus publication of the Leyte Normal University (LNU), were shocked to find that Facebook had taken down their social media page on Tuesday evening, October 31.

“According to the notice from Facebook, the page was unpublished due to impersonation,” Troy Ortega, a member of An Lantawan, told Rappler on Tuesday.

This happened after An Lantawan published a statement on its Facebook page on Monday, October 30, addressing LNU’s advisory, which stated that enforcing the university’s accreditation process on the campus publication does not curtail any freedom of expression and freedom of the press.

Recently, An Lantawan staff said they were warned by the Office of the Vice President for Student Development, headed by Generoso Mazo, that they were not allowed to post news updates with the An Lantawan name and logo.

“According to the VPSD, this caution was due to the fact that An Lantawan had not yet secured accreditation for the Academic Year 2023-2024,” An Lantawan’s statement read.

On Monday, October 30, An Lantawan officially released a statement calling out the LNU administration for asserting an accreditation process on the campus paper that would potentially risk its editorial independence.

(Photos from An Lantawan) pic.twitter.com/wAcMl8SxUS

— John Sitchon (@TheJohnSitchon) October 31, 2023

This is the first time that the accreditation process was enforced on the campus publication since it was founded in the 1970s.

Campus publications from other universities, former LNU students, and An Lantawan criticized the accreditation for its restrictive nature and for contradicting the LNU student manual and Campus Journalism Act of 1991 that guarantee its editorial independence.

The campus publication called the accreditation a “restrictive mechanism that endangers a student publication’s core principles – a maneuver to stifle the academic freedom of the university to organize and exercise press freedom.”

An Lantawan staff have managed to retrieve their Facebook page as of this posting. However, the post carrying their statement against LNU had been removed.

The heads of the campus publication suspected that the page may have been taken down by a series of “mass-reporting attacks.” – Rappler.com