Targeted

EVERY day, people walk the earth daunted by security challenges. With alarming terror threats on the rise, attacks on journalists also remain a worldwide scourge.
With a score of 41.19, the Philippines is ranked 141st out of 180 in the 2015 World Press Freedom Index by the Reporters Sans Frontieres (RSF- Reporters Without Borders). While this is a leap from being ranked 149th the previous year, the country remains among those with “very difficult” press situations in the world.
The Paris-based watch group ranked the performance of 180 countries according to a range of criteria that include media pluralism and independence, respect for the safety and freedom of journalists, and the legislative, institutional and infrastructural environment in which the media operate. The 2015 World Press Freedom Index highlights the worldwide deterioration in 2014. According to RSF, wars, the growing threat from non-state operatives, violence during demonstrations and the economic crisis, push media freedom to retreat in all five continents.
Extrajudicial killings have continued to be a recurring nightmare in the Philippines. The deaths of journalists in the country are believed to be related to the victims’ coverage and exposure of corruption and other illegal activities by politicians or high profile individuals.
Just last week, news of a radio broadcaster who was gunned down in front of his workplace shocked the peaceful province of Bohol.On Friday, Feb. 13, Engineer Maurito Lim was sitting inside his car parked outside station DYRD-AM waiting for his broadcast when a gunman casually approached his vehicle and shot the victim at close range. The bullet pierced through the window of Lim’s car and hit him in the left jaw. The victim was rushed to a nearby hospital but was pronounced dead shortly after.
Before his death, Lim was a commentator for a weekly radio program in Tagbilaran City, Bohol. The hard-hitting “Chairman Mao On Board” program is notorious for its criticisms on incumbent Bohol Gov. Edgar M. Chatto, and has accused the politician as protector of illegal drugs. Despite the circumstance of Lim’s death, local authorities are ruling out media-related work as motive in Lim’s death.
The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) strongly condemns Lim’s death.
“While we seriously doubt demanding justice will get us, or Maurito Lim’s family and colleagues, anywhere, we challenge the government to prove us wrong by acting swiftly to solve the case, arrest the killers and, most important, the mastermind who ordered his death,” said in its statement.
NUJP added that Lim is second journalist murdered in Bohol, the 172nd in the country since 1986, and the 31st under the administration of Pres. Benigno Aquino III.
The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) also laments the recent death of one of its colleagues. The IFJ criticized the country’s culture of impunity, which it described as an epidemic.
“The killing of Maurito Lim is a despicable and cowardly act of the highest order. The IFJ expresses its deepest sympathies to the family and colleagues of Maurito Lim,”said IFJ Asia Pacific acting director Jane Worthington.
Despite the commitment of authorities and the media to find effective actions to safeguard journalists in the Philippines—especially those that cover the most violent regions—the attacks against the press apparently have not stopped. With the dangers of working as a journalist still lingering, media men are forced to renege on their duties— quit their jobs or censor their work.
Unresolved cases, ineffective political actions and the culture of impunity, continue to bog down noble efforts by international journalist associations and NGOs to keep journalists safe in the world. Extrajudicial killings have already received aggressive public attention. What this needs now are words put into action, before the Philippines is tagged as the worst place for journalists, again.
(AJPress)