Juanito V. Jabat: The FREEMAN publisher to receive Perlas Award

CEBU, Philippines - While Hollywood personalities are given Oscar awards to honor them of their excellence in the field of show business, Filipinos who have shown “worthwhile values and traits of behavior, touched the lives of other people and excelled in their profession” are given the prestigious Grand Perlas Award.

The Grand Perlas Award is given annually by the Philippines Foundation Incorporated, an outstanding non-government organization made up of civic spirited individuals who promote the best of Filipino talents, skills and resources.

This year will be the 22nd year of giving out the award and included in the list of awardees is The FREEMAN publisher Juanito V. Jabat.

The foundation cited Mr. Jabat as an awardee due to his valuable role in the media profession.

PFI is honoring him for his dedication and humility in his chosen career, which started way back in 1952.

Jabat he started as a copy boy for Manila Times while still studying at the University of Santo Tomas taking up Journalism.

After which he became a correspondent for different newspapers based in the United States, Australia and England.

He became an Asia-Pacific correspondent for the Gemini News Service of London and in the international news agency of the Scripps-Howard Co. of New York.

He became a reporter of The FREEMAN in 1965, and later became an associate editor and then the editor-in-chief.

He is also the co-founder of Banat News.

His hard work in the field of media was not overseen as he have received numerous awards in the past including Most Outstanding Newspaper Editor given by the Cebu Newspaper Workers foundation and the Top Asian Trade Journalist award awarded by the American Trade journalists Association.

Mr. Jabat said that he is very grateful for the award and that he is thankful that he was included as one of the awardees.

Also he would like to thank PFI for recognizing his work in media.

The awards ceremony will be held today at SM Theatre One in SM City Cebu, 5:30 pm. —AJ de la Torre/NLQ(THE FREEMAN)