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Friday, December 03, 2004
Kalinga-based journalist murdered
BAGUIO CITY -- A young journalist working for a local newspaper in Tabuk, Kalinga, was found dead by residents near the Tabuk Central School on Wednesday, five days after he was said to have been abducted.
The body of Stephen Omaois, 24, which bore head injuries and tortured marks, was formally identified by his relatives Thursday morning at a funeral parlor in Tabuk, the capital town of Kalinga.
Kalinga Police Director James Dogao believed Omaois, who was working as a writer for Guru News Weekly, a six-month-old local newspaper, was hit with huge stones until he died.
Omaois's body also bore torture marks, was defaced and unidentifiable, and starting to bloat when found.
A task force was already formed to determine the motive behind Omaois's murder and identify his killers.
Dogao initially believed the killing was not job-related, although a report from the local National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) quoted residents as saying "there was already an earlier threat from unknown people against Omaois related to the exercise of his profession as a journalist."
Omaois, who also worked as a stringer of the government-run dzRK Radyo ng Bayan-Tabuk, has been writing on developmental and community issues for Guru for five months now, according to his editor Dr. Estefania Kollin.
The NUJP Baguio-Benguet, meanwhile, condemned Omaois's killing and tagged it as an attack against press freedom and people's right to information.
"We join our colleagues in urging the Philippine National Police and concerned agencies in the area to conduct an impartial investigation for the immediate disposal of justice for the death of Omaois," NUJP Baguio-Benguet chairman Artemio Dumlao Jr. said in a statement.
NUJP national chair Inday Espina-Varona, meanwhile, stressed, "the murder and torture of Omaois--the 13th this year--highlights how inutile law enforcers have become in the face of criminality."
"The murder of Omaois, who was on the trail of corruption charges involving a public works project in Pinukpuk town, should disabuse our law enforcers of the notion that slain journalists had it coming," she added.
"Top PNP officials, including Director-General Edgar Aglipay, have hinted that lack of fairness in reportage and the lack of discipline on matters of security are major factors in the murders of journalists. Aglipay is wrong. Omaois and several victims of the record violence hounding the Philippine media were 'guilty' of trying to ferret out the interlocking directorates of misgovernance and criminality in their communities," the statement said.
The Omaois family migrated from Mountain Province and established residence in Casigayan, Tabuk, Kalinga. (Cheryl G. Cruz)
(December 3, 2004 issue)
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