The Contratistas’ defender

 

Onion-skinned received quite a number of e-mails reacting to yesterday’s post.

Some provided Onion-skinned  names of Prima Contratista’s reliable media contacts and details of The Contratistas’ activities.  Not a few simply gave the e-mail equivalent of a hearty laugh.

Interestingly, of all the e-mails Onion-skinned received, only one wrote in defense of Prima Contratista.  On Onion-skinned’s claim that Prima Contratista left journalism, implying that her current gig is more lucrative, the sender wrote:  “No, no, no.  She was fired!”

So we stand corrected.

Wait.  That’s not a defense?

We stand corrected.

The Contratistas

Which means, of course, “The Contractors”.

And true to their name, this recently formed cabal of young, relatively young and reluctantly old journalists and media persons are contracted by their leader, Prima Contratista, to sneak press releases into newsrooms and push slants into news stories coming out of them.

The group used to hang out at the office of a government official, where Prima Contratista used to work (unofficially), and on particularly good “paydays”, in videoke bars as well. In videoke bars, they rehearse not only the lines to their favorite songs, but more importantly, the lines they have been contracted to write into their stories,

With that government official gone, Prima Contratista was picked up recently by an old discredited politico who is not only aging, but is dying to make a comeback.

Prima Contratista used to be a reporter, though not a very successful one. She wrote bad stories, and embarrassed other reporters in press conferences by asking bad questons and her bad habit of bringing her noisy kid along. And for scooping up the free snacks before everyone else, and even before the host could offer them.

But hey, who knows? She already has under contract reporters from all major dailies — Cebu Daily News, The Freeman and even SunStar — as well as radio and TV stations. Maybe, by being a “contratista” — that is, contracting out p.r. work to jourmalists and media persons — she has found her true calling.

Maybe even, I’m told, being true to her name.