TWO days before he was shot and seriously wounded last December 16, 2021, block-time broadcaster Rico Osmeña talked about the alleged Chinese vegetable smuggling in Cebu: the stories he wrote for the Manila-based "Daily Tribune," along with his earlier commentaries, which, he said, national media picked up, leading to a Senate committee inquiry.
'HULGAHULGA-ON PA TA.' Rico Osmeña, 60 this August, told his audience in that Tuesday, December 14, "Karon Sugbo" broadcast on dyLA radio: "Hulgahulga-on pa 'ta, patyon, tungod lang kay kita'y ga-expose sa smuggling." A video clip of the broadcast obtained by Explainer confirms that.
There was indeed an attempt to kill him, about 1 p.m. of December 16, hours before Typhoon Odette struck Cebu. Just after leaving the radio station at the pier area, he rode in a "modernized" jeepney, when one of two persons riding a motorcycle in tandem shot him at M.J. Cuenco Ave., Cebu City.
He took two .45 cal. bullet wounds: one damaged his left lung, deadened his left arm and the other bullet entered his shoulder, going to his neck and a part of his back. He was hospitalized for two weeks and therapy for his left arm could take six months, he said.
[ALSO READ: "Seares: Broadcaster Rico Osmena, who survived December 16 gun attack, still in pain..." Media's Public, January 14, 2022]
MOTIVE, THERE IS. There may be enough motive for the suspected smugglers in ordering the hit. Rico -- who said his dad Miling is half-brother of the late prominent politicians Emilio "Lito" and John "Sonny" Osmeña -- owned up the expose.
He did these: the radio commentaries and the news stories in the Tribune, which he strings for, and the personal off-media requests he made to the Cebu Customs district collector and even Senate President Vicente Sotto III, to whom Rico "whispered" the names of the persons involved in the smuggling when "Tito Sen" visited Cebu last December 10.
A local story that became a national story, which became the subject of a Senate investigation, which threatened, if true, the source of big profit to the people involved in the alleged smuggling, whose exposure could cause its and shutdown and might even lead to prosecution. Many journalists have been killed for less heavy motive.
WHAT SMUGGLING? Some people asked that when Rico raised the probable motive in a short interview with Media's Public last January 14. Obviously, there was little or no reporting in local media about the carrots-and-cabbages smuggling.
In a September 26, 2021 post on Tribune.net.ph, digital site of the newspaper, he reported that La Trinidad Vegetable Trading Areas Inc. appealed to the Bureau of Customs to “probe the alleged of smuggled carrots and cabbages in Cebu and Manila markets.”
The complainants said their Cebu buyers reported that at least four container vans of vegetables from China were being delivered weekly at Carbon Market. The vegetables were retailed at P50 per kilo, competing with locally grown counterparts priced at P85 to P115 per kilo. That caused the drop of vegetable prices from P70 to P25-P30 per kilo and the cancellations of orders placed with local producers. That was happening not just at Carbon but also in Divisoria in Manila, the news report said.
"Smugglers" in Cebu and Manila may be responsible for the bringing in of the items but some Customs personnel and procedure could be faulted too. There are supposed to be "several layers of examination -- from profiling, document checking, x-ray examination and physical examination." How did the Chinese vegetables pass through all that and land in warehouses and turn up in the local markets. Cebu Customs Collector Charlito Martin Mendoza reportedly said they will look into the apparent lapse of gatekeepers.
FOREWARNED. Rico was apparently forewarned and knew the people who were after him. In at least two broadcast clips Explainer listened to Friday, January 21, he talked about the threat, saying his enemies "can penetrate us here." But if they, in his words, "surveillance us, we also surveillance them." He said he is not rich (financially) but "I am rich in connections."
He also read a letter from the Carpio Duterte law firm in Cebu informing the Bureau of Customs that a person was posing to BOC officials as a close friend/associate of Davao City Mayor Sara Duterte-Carpio, suggesting that the person had something to do with the smuggling.
Rico told Explainer he mentioned only the first name of the person but apparently that was enough identification.
Rico said on the air that he would not be stopped and if anything happened to him, his killers are "on the record."
Well, the bullets stopped him, at least for now, and whatever was "on the record" wasn't enough for the police to make any arrest.
NO SUSPECT, NO PERSON OF INTEREST. Even assuming Rico's expose of the smuggling case provided motive for the shooting, police have yet to find evidence that would (a) identify the gunmen and (b) link them to the alleged smugglers.
No evidence yet against that riding-in-tandem killers. Closed-circuit TV cameras or eyewitnesses have yet to lead police to any of the two suspected killers and, after that, the masterminds. At least, not to the knowledge of the public. No police announcement of any breakthrough in the investigation, despite the disclosed prodding of the Presidential Task Force on Media Security (PTFoMS).
Not a suspect, not even a person of interest.
Bigger, more immediate tasks given the police in coping with the pandemic may partly explain the slowdown on the investigation. Police are stumped and they'd rather spend time checking on persons who are out of their residences, defying Cebu City's stay-at-home order, which now carries the threat of arrest and prosecution, and endangering public safety.
In his broadcast last December 14, Rico joked about Odette being the name of a movie porn star. He said he might have a live broadcast from a lunch meeting on the 16th. He did not have that meeting or broadcast. He was dead to the world, not because of Odette but because of the two bullets and the surgeries required to save his life.