Bicol Mail is reprinting below the full text of the letter below whose last part bearing the name of the letter sender had been inadvertently missed in our Jan. 14, 2016 issue. We also include our news correspondent’s response to the said letter. We apologize to the letter sender and our readers for the lapse in graphics lay-outing and proofreading. EDITOR
This refers to the news article written by Mr. Danny O. Calleja in the January 7, 2016 issue of the Bicol Mail with the headline “Bicol has poor 11% passing rate in eligibility tests.”
The news article made it appear that Mr. Calleja interviewed the undersigned on Wednesday, January 6, 2016, as the source of the news which is a blatant lie. Mr. Calleja has neither called nor came to the office to do an interview with the undersigned. Moreover, the headline was actually erroneous. In a News Release that we have posted in our Facebook page on January 5, 2016, which appears to be the source of Mr. Calleja, the CSC bared the top 10 passers in the Bicol Region for the October 18, 2015 Career Service Examination-Paper and Pencil Test (CSE-PPT). It was also publicized that Bicol Region is among the top performing regions in terms of passing rate in said CSE-PPT. In fact, it ranked 5th among all the regions in the country with a passing rate of 12.34%. The 11.02% passing rate alluded to in the headline is NOT for the Bicol region but for the whole country. Thus, proclaiming that Bicol has poor passing rate in the CSE-PPT is downright incorrect which does not speak well of your newspaper which claims to be the “Best-Edited Provincial Newspaper.”
In addition, Mr. Calleja wrote that the undersigned attributed the poor showing in the exams to the very low level of preparedness in taking the examination among most of the examinees and that examinees should prepare themselves by taking reviews and refreshers on the subjects covered by the test just like taking an entrance exam in college. Considering that there was no interview conducted, this statement is a figment of the writer’s imagination, which has no room in news articles.
In view thereof, it is respectfully requested that your news article be corrected and a statement be issued that Mr. Calleja NEVER interviewed the undersigned for his article. A copy of our News Release is attached for your guidance and reference.
Knowing your adherence to responsible journalism, favorable action on this matter will be highly appreciated.
Danny O. Calleja’s reply: The story never said that Bicol scored among the poorest as it goes this way:
Anyway, Atty. Daisy Bragais said results of this latest CSE-PPT delivered a piece of good news to Bicol given that the region ranked 5th among top performing regions in terms of passing rate.
“Collective figures show that Bicol or Region 5 is among the top performing regions in terms of passing rate by notching 12.34 percent which is above the 11.02 percent national performance,” Bragais said.
Yes I admit that I never interviewed her but my source is a press statement released by the CSC regional office and as a matter of protocol, it is attributed to a high ranking officer of the agency.