By SAMMY JULIAN
Manila News Bureau Chief
MANILA – Malacañang has ordered the Philippine National Police (PNP) to hunt down those responsible for killing a Davao del Sur radio broadcaster.
“We condemn the killing of radio broadcaster Sammy Oliverio in Digos City, Davao del Sur,” Presidential Communications Operations Secretary Herminio Coloma Jr. said.
Oliverio was a block-timer in Digos City airing programs on behalf of the local government unit over Radyo Ukay and other radio stations.
While on his way home in Digos City, Oliverio was shot dead on May 23 by motorcycle-riding men.
Investigators have yet to determine the motive behind the attack on the 57-year-old broadcaster.
“The PNP has been directed to exert maximum efforts to track the assailants and bring them before the bar of justice,” Coloma said.
Oliverio is the second broadcast journalist killed this month.
On May 4, Richard Najid, 35, acting manager of DxNN PowerMix FM in Bongao, Tawi-Tawi, was gunned down as he was going home from a basketball game around 7:30 p.m.
“DJ Troy,” as he was known, died while being treated at a hospital.
The police said the identities and motive of the perpetrators remained unknown. The incident happened a day after the observance of World Press Freedom Day.
He was the second radio broadcaster slain in Bongao since 2007. In June of that year, Vicente Sumalpong of the government-run Radyo ng Bayan was killed.
Under the current administration, Nadjid was the 27th journalist killed, according to the National Union of Journalists in the Philippines.
During the recent visit of United States President Barack Obama, President Benigno Aquino III was put on the spot about the media killings in the country.
Asked by a member of the US media about his efforts to resolve these crimes, the President said when it comes to journalists, it was not a policy of the government to silence critics.
Aquino said an inter-agency committee has been formed to investigate extrajudicial killings as well as forced disappearances.
Of the 62 suspected cases of extrajudicial killings, he said only 10 were determined to fall under that category. And of the 10, Aquino pointed out that only one incident happened under his watch./PN
