BAGUIO CITY — The summer capital’s working journalists on Sunday advocated for economic protection during the 16th year commemoration of the 2009 massacre of 57 people by a Maguindanao political clan, including 32 newsmen who were found in shallow graves.
In a statement, the Baguio Correspondents and Broadcasters Club Inc. declared that its members reaffirm their “unwavering commitment to the principles of press freedom, truth and justice (to) honor the lives of our colleagues who were brutally silenced.”
But the group asserted that “true press freedom is impossible when the very practitioners of the craft are themselves vulnerable and unprotected.”
“Therefore, we continue our resolve to tirelessly uphold the economic rights and welfare of all media practitioners and workers (and) call for an immediate end to unfair labor practices that compromise job security, unjust compensation that fails to reflect the demanding and vital nature of journalistic work, and unsecured work tenure and precarious employment contracts that leave media workers economically vulnerable,” read the statement penned by BCBC president and radio newsman Dionisio Dennis Jr.
“Our colleagues deserve stability, fair compensation, and respectful working conditions commensurate with the crucial role they play in a democratic society, ” BCBC asserted, as well as their “absolute protection from the constant threat of harassment, threats, and intimidation.”
“Journalists must be allowed to perform their duty — delivering the news as fairly and factually as possible and being the voice of the voiceless — without fear of reprisal,” the group says.
The journalists were abducted and murdered along with a convoy of family members and supporters of gubernatorial candidate Esmael Mangudadatu, then a municipal mayor, who were on their way to file his certificate of candidacy. Among the slain were Mangudadatu’s pregnant wife and sister.
His rival, Andal Ampatuan Jr., was convicted for their murders in 2019 along with several conspirators, but other suspects did not stand trial.
The non-profit Center for International Law on Saturday said it will seek an urgent motion before the Court of Appeals to resolve the pending appeals in the Maguindanao massacre cases and to judicially recognize journalist Reynaldo Momay, the 58th victim in the killings. /das