GMA radio station manager wounded in slay try in Bacolod

BACOLOD CITY – A hard-hitting veteran broadcaster was shot early yesterday morning at a public market in Sagay City, about 80 kilometers north from here.

Sagay police chief Superintendent William Señoron said Ferdinand “Bambi” Yngson, station manager of RGMA Bacolod, was shot on the left arm by a certain Romeo Corvo after a confrontation. The suspect, allegedly a deputized officer of the Land Transportation Office, was arrested immediately.

The 46-year-old broadcaster was rushed to the Alfredo Marañon Sr. District Hospital in Sagay but was later transferred to the Riverside Medical Center in Bacolod City. He has been declared out of danger.

Yngson’s wife, Annabelle, was with him when the incident happened.  She was unharmed.

Yngson anchors the noontime program, “Ratsada.” He joined the station in 1998 as anchorman-reporter and was promoted to station manager last February.

Señoron said the motive might be “personal,” adding that witnesses claimed there was a confrontation between Yngson and the suspect prior to the shooting.

Philippine National Police (PNP) chief Director General Oscar Calderon ordered a thorough investigation into the incident.

Sen. Ramon “Bong” Revilla Jr., meanwhile, strongly denounced the attack on Yngson.

“Because of the escalation of media murders, the Philippines is still among the countries branded as press freedom violator. That’s why I fully support the President’s call to institutionalize harsher penalties for perpetrators of extrajudicial killings,” he said.

Revilla likewise urged the Presidential Task Force Against Media Harassment (PTFAMH) to perform its mission of solving media slayings.

Yngson’s case is the first attack on a media practitioner in Negros Occidental in years. – With Artemio Dumlao, Cecille Suerte Felipe