'Who will take care of our children?'

KORONADAL CITY , Philippines  – With our husbands gone, who will take care of our children?

This was the collective cry of the grieving widows and relatives of the journalists who were among those killed in last Monday’s massacre in Maguindanao.

The relatives called on the government to take a harder approach against the killers.

Glena Legarta, wife of journalist Bienvenido “Jun” Legarta of Frontiera News, is calling on the government to go after the killers of her husband and let them “see the face of death” for their “inhuman acts.”

“Why did they kill my husband? What they did was unpardonable,” she said.

Glena said until now, she and their three children could not accept that their breadwinner is already gone.

“Paano na kami ngayon? What future lies ahead of us? Who will now feed and pay for the upkeep of our children? I cannot do it alone,” Glena cried.

Glena joined the grieving widows and relatives of the 12 journalists who called on the government to take immediate action against the suspects.

They were joined by various sectors that included media organizations, militant groups and student organizations across the nation and even groups from overseas that are all demanding an investigation into and early resolution of last Monday’s carnage that left over 40 people killed.

The Commission on Human Rights (CHR) also said the government is employing a “kid glove” policy against the suspects, who are known members of a political family in the region.

CHR focal commissioner for Mindanao Jose Manuel Mamauag warned that any foot dragging in the investigation and prosecution of the suspects would lead to a whitewash.

A relative of slain journalist Rey Merisco revealed the relatives of the murdered reporters have collectively urged the military not to spare the suspects and “kill them all.”

“They (suspects) are not human. What they did to the journalists was inhuman. The military should not spare them,” he said.

Merisco, a correspondent of a local weekly paper Periodico Ini, was among the 12 journalists who were killed.

“Devils don’t deserve to live,” Merisco’s relative said. 

For Allan Cachuela, younger brother of Manila Star reporter Bal Cachuela, “It’s very painful to lose a very good and loving brother.”

“I hope justice would be given to all the massacred media people, including my brother Bal. I hope also the military would neutralize all the killers. They deserve no mercy for what they did,” he said.

Families and relatives of journalists based in General Santos City supported the call for a “shoot-to-kill order” for all the suspects.

Various groups from the Bicol region and Bulacan province staged indignation rallies denouncing last Monday’s carnage in Maguindanao.

The Albay chapter of the Kapisanan ng mga Brodkaster sa Pilipinas (KBP) led by Danny Garcia said the government must act with dispatch in solving the murders.

About a hundred journalists joined the black-shirted students in a protest rally in Bulacan State University.

At the University of the Philippines, officials condemned the massacre as not only indicative of the state of affairs in Maguindanao but in the entire nation itself.

The Foreign Correspondents Association of the Philippines (Focap) issued a statement condemning last Monday’s carnage, “the heaviest loss of lives for the Philippine media, possibly in the whole world, in a single day and comes on the heels of a series of many unsolved killings of Filipino journalists in recent years.”

“We condole with the families of the murdered journalists, some of whom (as) Focap members had occasion to work with us in the past. These courageous media personnel were only doing their job to report crucial political developments in Mindanao and should not have been directly targeted by any partisan armed groups,” Focap said.

Catholic and Muslim religious leaders issued a joint statement condemning the massacre.

“We grieve with the families of the victims, offer our prayers for the eternal repose of the innocent souls, and call upon the authorities to squarely address this atrocity,” Davao Archbishop Fernando Capalla said in a statement on behalf of the Bishops Ulama Conference (BUC).

Network giant ABS-CBN joined the protest and issued a statement calling on the government to take decisive action against the culprits.

“Three days have passed since more than 50 people, including journalists, were brutally murdered in Maguindanao, and we have yet to see government take decisive action. This unprecedented scale of violence erodes our faith in the rule of law. It sends a chill through journalists who continue to shine the spotlight on these killing fields,” ABS-CBN said.

“We at ABS-CBN urge the authorities to hold the guilty parties accountable and show that justice is blind to politics,” the television network said.

Television network GMA-7 also issued a statement denouncing the murder of the journalists, which, they said, were only playing their essential role of “bearing witness on behalf of the public and to report on an important event without fear or favor.”

“The crime that occurred in Ampatuan was uniquely savage, but it was also an extreme example of the violent tendency in our politics. At the other extreme are the many citizens who are bravely committed to the difficult and complex process of peacefully deciding who our leader should be, such as those souls who perished on Monday,” GMA-7 said.

“Much will (hinge) on how the government reacts in the coming days. For what is emerging is evidence that the assailants were not outside the law but part of the political machinery of local officials backed by the Arroyo administration,” the network said.

Probable cause

Mamauag, on the other hand, said the CHR’s initial investigation of the incident revealed there is a probable cause that would warrant an investigation of the suspects.

He said the findings even bolstered the impression of police inaction to invite any of the principal suspects for questioning.

“A probable cause has existed and under criminal proceedings, subsequent arrest should follow even in the absence of the court issued warrant of arrest,” Mamauag said.

Mamauag explained a warrantless arrest could be effected under exceptional circumstances such as the accounts of a survivor identifying a suspect.

The military said the Ampatuan clan, which has a political lock on the areas of Maguindanao where the murders took place, is the prime suspect.

Buluan Vice Mayor Esmail Mangudadatu, whose wife Genalyn was among the victims, accused Datu Unsay town Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr. of having ordered the massacre.

Genalyn was to file her husband’s certificate of candidacy to contest the governorship of Andal Ampatuan Sr., the patriarch of the Ampatuan family and known political allies of President Arroyo in the region.

Genalyn led a convoy of more than 40 people, including 12 journalists, to file her husband’s certificate of candidacy when they were stopped by some 100 heavily armed men and taken hostage on a remote highway in Barangay Salman near the town of Ampatuan.

Ramil Bajo, of The STAR, said the Mangudadatus had invited them to cover the event.

Bajo said a colleague, Henry Araneta of radio dzRH, relayed the invitation to join the Mangudadatus in filing the certificate of candidacy of the Buluan vice mayor to run as governor of Maguindanao against incumbent Ampatuan.

“I declined because my son Reilly was not feeling well and I had decided to bring him to a doctor,” Bajo said.

Bajo said he was invited by Araneta to join other journalists in a rented van.

Araneta and the other journalists ended up among the victims in last Monday’s massacre.

Bajo, who has been covering the Socsargen (South Cotabato, Sultan Kudarat, Sarangani and General Santos City) area for The STAR for about six years now, said he never thought his colleagues would meet such a brutal end.

“Fortunately, I declined the invitation, otherwise I might end up dead too,” he said. –Ramil Bajo, John Unson, Aurea Calica, Evelyn Macairan, Cet Dematera, Jose Rodel Clapano, Dino Balabo