Murder as ‘art’

BEHIND THE SCENES
Alfred P. Dizon

Murder has been elevated to an “art” or a “must” by some politicians and warlords of this Banana Republic.

Some years ago, I met a mayor in the Ilocos Region who said he held his position for more than two decades owing to the “trust” of his constituents in him for keeping the peace in his town.

“Some have tried to run in elections and unseat me, but were not successful because the people always voted for me,” he said.” The reason,” he added, “people did not want lawlessness to reign in my town. With me as the mayor, criminals had to find other places to sow trouble.”

He had a soft voice. When he called one of his men to bring us coffee, he had the look of reverence for the old man. Folks called him Apo Lakay. You don’t mess around with the old man, they told me.

The mayor was well read, educated, knew fine points of the law and had the fine etiquette of an aristocrat. When he went around town, he talked with lesser folk in a fatherly way and people impishly smiled at him saying “wen Apo” or “wen Mayor.”

He would banter with kids but the drunkards would look away like they didn’t see him when he passed by. He toured me around, even at his beach resort where we held what he called a commemorative party for a relative.

Seated and looking at the wide expanse of the China Sea, he said,”Adun a iti dudldog nga napan naglanguyen dita baybay. (There have been a lot of trouble makers who went swimming in this sea.”)

Oh! I said getting the drift. “Ngem awan ketdi tattan ta nakaadal da metten. (But there are no more troublemakers who swim there anymore because they have learned their lesson.)”

The old man has since went to the Great Beyond just recently but people still say, they miss his kindly ways and for making the town peaceful a lot of years during his term.

The sleepy town is not so peaceful nowadays. There have been some killings, folks say, even those related to politics that one has to watch one’s mouth when one speaks.

Known for its tobacco and corn, the town is just one among the municipalities in the Ilocos Region or elsewhere in the country nowadays where violence is part of the culture of politics, impunity, graft and corruption.
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Last Tuesday night, radio broadcaster Joselito Agustin was shot dead as he rode home on a motorcycle with his nephew in Barangay Barit, Bacarra town in Laoag City. Agustin, anchorman of dzJC Aksyon Radyo-Laoag, sister station of dzRH of the Manila Broadcasting Co., was murdered a month after his residential compound in Barangay Natba was strafed with rifle fire. No one has been arrested for the strafing. His superiors said Agustin had been criticizing corruption in Bacarra.

Agustin was quoted in a national daily as the 139th media worker murdered in the Philippines since the restoration of democracy in 1986, and the 102nd under the Arroyo administration. He was killed just a day after Desidario Camangyan, anchorman of Sunrise FM in Mati, Davao Oriental, was shot dead in plain view of a crowd, while hosting a barangay singing contest. Camangyan had been critical of illegal logging in Mati.
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Meanwhile, the patriarch and key members of the Ampatuan clan are behind bars for multiple murder cases. But the arrest of those accused of planning and carrying out the massacre of 57 people, 30 of them media workers, does not appear to have served as a deterrent to those who think the best way to deal with negative publicity is by permanently silencing the messenger. Since January, four journalists have been murdered around the country while a fifth survived an attack.

Relatives of most of the victims believe the attacks were work-related, but this cannot be established unless the perpetrators are brought to justice. This is where the government has failed. Every failure reinforces the culture of impunity that encourages more people to resort to murder in dealing with the press.

Most of the 100 murders since the start of the Arroyo administration remain unsolved, and it may be too much to hope that the two latest cases will be any different. The task of ending the impunity that was capped by the Maguindanao massacre on Nov. 23 last year now falls on the shoulders of the incoming administration of Benigno Aquino III and people expect to see major changes in respect for human rights and giving justice for victims once he assumes office.