CHIZ CONDEMNS MURDER OF RADIO BROADCASTER

Opposition Senator Francis "Chiz" Escudero on Monday denounced the early morning shooting of a radio broadcaster based in Misamis Occidental, labeling the perpetrators as "cowards" for using violence to silence their critics.

Misamis Occidental-based radio broadcaster Ernie Rollin was shot dead at around 5:30 a.m. at a gas station while he was en route to work in Barangay Talic, Ligaya.

"If this dastardly killing is connected to his work as a journalist, then his murderers are cowards," said Escudero, chair of the Senate justice and human rights committee.

"I urge the local police to do their best in getting Rollin's killers. Media is an essential pillar of democracy and we cannot allow anyone to silence the press thru violence and other insidous means," he said. The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines said that Rollin is the second journalist to be murdered this year and the 63rd since President Arroyo assumed office in 2001.

Last month, another radio commentator Badrodin Abbas was shot and killed in Cotabato City.