DPA/Manila

Broadcaster and newspaper publisher Boy Conejos clutched his rosary as he joined hundreds in burying a friend and colleague who was shot dead outside his home in the southern Philippines.
Gregorio Ybanez, also a broadcaster and newspaper publisher, was gunned down August 18 in the southern province of Davao Del Norte, about 950 kilometres south of Manila. He was one of three reporters slain in a span of two weeks.
Conejos said Ybanez had been receiving death threats before he was murdered, allegedly due to exposes of anomalies believed to have been perpetrated by the management of an electricity co-operative in Davao Del Norte.
Conejos himself has also been receiving death threats since 2013, due to his commentaries and reports about the co-operative’s financial status.
“Sometimes, a prayer is your only shield against all these threats,” the 68-year-old Conejos said, chuckling. “I just pray to God that nothing will happen to me.”
Ybanez was buried on Saturday, as a columnist was shot dead in the northern Philippines, bringing to seven the number of reporters killed in 2015.
Thirty-one media workers have been slain since the President Benigno Aquino III became president in 2010.
The relentless attacks against the media have made the Philippines the third most dangerous place in the world for journalists, despite having what is touted to be the freest press in Asia, according to the New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ).
In 2009, 32 media workers were among those killed in the worst political massacre in the Philippines. The alleged masterminds of the brutal attack have been detained, but the trial has dragged on for more than five years.
Many of the media killings have remained unresolved, and this has “emboldened those bent on stifling a free press through the gun,” said Shawn Crispin, CPJ’s South-East Asia representative.
“The Philippines is one of the most dangerous places in the world to be a journalist precisely because the killers of media members nearly always walk free,” he said.
“It’s a combination of a failed justice system and a lack of high-level political will to address the problem.”
The government has condemned the recent spate of attacks on the media, and stressed that the police have been directed to solve the crimes.
“The Aquino administration has steadfastly advocated and implemented a policy of ‘no prior restraint’ on the mass media,” Communications Secretary Herminio Coloma said.
Nearly 70% of media killings in the Philippines were found to be related to the victims’ work in the press, according to the Centre for Media Freedom and Responsibility.
Despite the attacks, the Philippine media has been uncowed.
“The threats are part of the job,” Conejos noted. “If we stop what we’re doing, how will people know what is really happening in government and the community? When you’re in media, you have to be prepared for everything, including death.”
With national elections coming up next year, there are fears that attacks against the media will escalate as journalists investigate politicians seeking office.
Community journalists face higher risks because the subjects of their exposes often know where they live and work, and have easy access to them, said Alwyn Alburo, vice president of the National Union of Journalists in the Philippines.
“Reporting is usually a life and death situation for the community journalists,” he said. “The sad thing is they don’t get the same perks as national journalists, their pay is usually low and they are not regular employees.”
The poor working conditions often lead community journalists to take on other jobs to augment their income, but that can create complications that increase their risks, Alburo said.
Some reporters moonlight as communication consultants to politicians or companies and government agencies that they sometimes have to report about, while others are members of academia or Corps.
Ybanez was a director on the board of the electricity co-operative that he was reporting about. He even filed a complaint against management for alleged anomalies.
The journalists’ union is planning a series of safety and training workshops around the country ahead of the election campaign coverage, focusing on hotspots where violence frequently occurs.
It has also set up a system where journalists can report threats, which the organisation in turn forwards to its international counterparts.
But they do not advocate that threatened journalists carry weapons to defend themselves.
“Arming ourselves would only create the perception that journalists are combatants,” Alburo said.
The CPJ stressed the need for the country’s justice system to provide protection for threatened journalists, who would otherwise have no recourse but to hide or employ bodyguards or arm themselves.
For Conejos, carrying a firearm is not an option despite the threats against him.
“I only carry my rosary. I’m an old man, maybe they will pity me and not kill me,” he said. “Besides, if it’s your time to go, it’s your time to go.”