GenSan journalist gunned down

DAVAO CITY ,Philippines  – Unidentified gunmen killed a local newspaper publisher and radio commentator late Thursday in General Santos City, police said.

Authorities identified the victim as Christopher Guarin, a radio commentator of RMN Broadcasting Inc. and publisher and editor-in-chief of the local tabloid Tatak.

Guarin, 42, was on his way home in his Kia car along Conel Road with his wife and child when two gunmen on a motorcycle opened fire.

The victim’s wife Lyn was hit in the arm while their nine-year-old daughter was unharmed.

Lyn told police that her husband managed to jump out of their car, but was chased by one of the gunmen who fired several shots more before escaping with his companion.

Guarin suffered five gunshot wounds in different parts of the body and one in the head.

The victim was rushed to the General Santos City Hospital but doctors declared him dead on arrival.

Region 12 police director Chief Superintendent Benjardi Mantele ordered an extensive investigation into the incident to determine the identities of the gunmen.

Mrs. Guarin said her husband had been received text messages warning him not to leave their house.

General Santos City police chief Senior Superintendent Cedric Train said the initial assessment indicated the attack could not be work-related because Guarin was not hard hitting on his radio program.

Train ordered police investigators to dig deeper into reports of the victim’s wife that her husband had been getting death threats prior to the incident.

The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) condemned the killing of Guarin and said he was the first journalist killed in 2012.

The NUJP said the murder occurred when the country ranked third after Iraq and Somalia in the worldwide list of unsolved murders of journalists by the New York-based press freedom watchdog Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) in its 2011 yearend survey last December.

The group said the Philippines has maintained third spot since 2010 from a 13-country list where journalists are murdered on a recurring basis and governments are unable or unwilling to prosecute the killers.

Lawmakers suggested that the government should tap private investigators and prosecutors in solving and stopping media killings.

Reps. Ben Evardone of Eastern Samar, a former journalist, and Alfredo Benitez of Negros Occidental made the suggestion hours after Guarin was gunned down.

“We are proposing that the government create an independent crack team of investigators and prosecutors from the private sector to investigate all cases of killings of journalists,” the two congressmen said in a joint statement.

“We are making this proposal as we condemn the latest killing of another journalist in Mindanao. We need to have a firm resolve to end this impunity. Unless these crimes against journalists are solved, we cannot hope to end this carnage,” they said.

They said the Philippines is among countries which are dangerous for journalists precisely “because crimes against media men are not solved.”

“Since our law enforcement and prosecution are unable to solve these crimes, we believe that there is already a need to have independent private sector-led investigation and prosecution teams. They should be empowered with vast authority to go after the perpetrators of these crimes. These unresolved crimes against journalists have chilling effects on the exercise of press freedom,” they added. - With John Unson, Artemio Dumlao, Jess Diaz, Cecille Suerte Felipe, Jaime Laude