Friday, April 14, 2023, 07:58
A few days after the journalist Lucía Méndez stated in a TVE gathering that Jon Rahm “is relatively Spanish”, the Information Council of the public entity has issued a statement asking the professional to rectify her words because, they understand, “that the statements of the commentators can have a direct impact on the credibility and work of the company’s professionals».
Lucía Méndez herself has not been slow to react to the petition -published at 10:30 p.m. this Thursday- and, through a thread on Twitter, has acknowledged that she made “an unfortunate comment” about the Biscayan golfer. In addition, she “sorry that it was interpreted as disrespectful.”
Freedom of expression must cover even comments that may give rise to this type of controversy. (3 of 3)
— Lucia Mendez Prada (@LuciaMendezEM) April 13, 2023
But the gathering is “surprised” that the TVE News Council “issues a statement on the ‘opinion’ of a journalist, a collaborator of the house since 2004, who does not belong to the TVE News Services.” And, finally, she affirms that “freedom of expression must protect even comments that may give rise to this type of controversy.”
Precisely, on this last point, in the press release from the Information Council they clarify that “they defend their freedom of expression, as it cannot be otherwise”, but remember what the heading ‘right of rectification’ says in the Manual of Style from TVE: “Any information that has been proven to be false or erroneous will be rectified diligently and with the treatment appropriate to the circumstances, without avoiding, if necessary, an apology and without the need to wait for the affected persons or institutions to request it” .
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The “false or erroneous” information to which the Information Council is told by Lucía Méndez in ‘La Hora de la 1’, the day after Jon Rahm’s victory in the Augusta Masters. The gathering questioned the origin of the Biscayne. «This man… is Spanish, well, relatively Spanish I mean…». Reason why he doubted whether the triumph should be celebrated: “It seems good to me that we write it down but…” “Having a homeland abroad is always good but it is not a triumph that arouses enthusiasm in the population,” he concluded. He also stated that golf is an “elite sport alien to the majority classes.”
I would love that @LuciaMendezEM explain to me why Jon Rahm is “relatively Spanish”, and it seems good that “we aim for the victory”. Is it because he doesn’t know that he is Spanish and Basque for a zillion generations? Or is there some other metamessage for insiders? pic.twitter.com/l3FY1v8Byw
— velardedaoiz2 (@velardedaoiz2) April 10, 2023
The TVE News Council itself is in charge in the statement of correcting these statements. They remember that Jon Rahm is from Biscay, from Barrika, and that his family has been “settled in Spain for generations.” And he adds: “Golf is the third sport by number of licenses in Spain, according to the latest data available from the Higher Sports Council.”