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| Despite Maguindanao Atrocities, Violence Continues to Assail Mediamen |
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| Written by Darwin Wally T. Wee |
| Thursday, 04 February 2010 07:40 |
  ZAMBOANGA CITY – HARASSMENTS and threats of death to journalists in this country still continue amid the overwhelming demand by global media to stamp violence against the fourth estate, which have gained international concern following the killings of more than 30 community media in Mindanao in November last year, which was seen as the worst single attack in the history of international press. In this month alone, at least three incidents of harassments were recorded by the National Union of Journalist of the Philippines (NUJP). The worst incident occurred on January 8, when unidentified gunmen ambushed but failed to kill Eugene Paet Y Piano, 49, a radio commentator of DWRS Commando Radio station, in Vigan, Ilocos Sur. Reports received by NUJP said that Paet, known among members of the local media community as “Commando Uno”, was heading home after his program at his radio station when waylaid by the gunmen. In another incident, pathetic as they said, Presidential Security Group (PSG) prevented Cirilo Renduque, cameraman of GMA-7 in Iloilo City, from coming near President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo because he was wearing a shirt demanding justice for victims of the Ampatuan massacre. “In an insensitive, arrogant and high-handed manner, the PSG personnel prevented Renduque and reporter Fabian Paderes from approaching and getting video footages at the tarmac of the Iloilo Airport during the arrival of the President on Tuesday, January 12,” NUJP Ilo-Ilo Chapter said. The group said despite repeatedly showing their identification cards accredited by the Philippine Information Agency and the Media Accreditation and Relations Office of the Office of the Press Secretary, Renduque and Paderes were not allowed to enter the tarmac because the cameraman was wearing a black shirt emblazoned with “Stop Killing Journalists” and the names of 27 journalists who were among those butchered in Ampatuan town in Maguindanao on November 23, 2009. “When has this become a security threat to the President? Is this offensive to the highest official of the land? Didn't the President herself declare a national day of mourning after the massacre and has not her various spokesperson repeatedly condemned the hideous crime?” the group asked. But just a day after the Ilo-Ilo incident, an anchorman in Iligan City was attacked by a member of the local city council while he was on air. Richel Umel, a corresponded of the Philippine Daily Inquirer and Iligan’s chapter chairman of the NUJP, said the beating happened after Albert Loyola of DXRJ scrutinized the Sangguniang Panlungsod Budget of 2009 that triggered Iligan City Councilor Chonilo Ruiz to “physically manhandle and maul the broadcast journalist.” He said the NUJP tried its best to contact Ruiz for comment but to no avail. Top officials of the NUJP and other media groups said these incidents only reveal in the loss of respect to laws and a continuing culture of impunity in the country. Media groups are still reeling from the effect of the Maguindanao massacre, which caught the national and international media groups by surprise. Nestor P. Burgos Jr., NUJP national chairman, said the year 2009 will forever be remembered as a year of unprecedented tribulation for the Philippine press, with the November 23 massacre in Ampatuan town in Maguindanao making its grisly mark in history as the worst ever attack on the media. Before the massacre, 104 Filipino journalists had been murdered since 1986, 67 of them under the administration of President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo alone. Only around five cases have resulted in the conviction of the killers, though no masterminds have yet to be arrested in any of the murders, the NUJP said. The NUJP recently set up a Justice Fund project that “seeks to raise the necessary finances that will help address the needs of the families of the victims of the massacre including a trauma counseling program, the implementation of a training program for the local media community and supporting the legal and advocacy efforts to seek justice for the victims.” Burgos said the Justice Fund also aims to build solidarity between media and the public and to deepen public understanding of factors that led to the massacre. “The Justice Fund seeks to build awareness not just on what happened in Ampatuan, Maguindanao on November 23, 2009 but on the system that breeds corruption, warlordism and political patronage which paved the way to the carnage,” he said. “The Justice Fund also aspires to encourage a Press that is critical and ethical, zealous of its rights and responsibilities,” he added. (Darwin T. Wee)   |