MANILA – Motorcycle gunmen riding in tandem struck anew, wounding a Philippine broadcaster in a daring early morning attack in Jaro, Iloilo, some 600 kilometers southwest of Manila on Friday, police said.

Police said the victim Fernando “Kapid” Gabio, a hard-hitting radio block timer suffered a gunshot wound in his right leg when two armed men on board a motorcycle shot Gabio while he cleaning his car parked on the roadside in Democracia, a village in Jaro district at 7 o’clock Friday morning.

Gabio anchors a radio program entitled “Mr. Expose” in Iloilo City and is known for his tirades mostly directed against Iloilo City lone district Congressman Jerry P. Trenas and Mayor Jed Patrick Mabilog.

The gunmen casually stopped their motorcycle where the broadcaster was busy cleaning his car and without saying a word one of the gunmen opened fire and sped away. Fortunately, Gabio’s wound was not fatal. Passersby rushed the radio journalist to the Iloilo Mission Hospital.

People who witnessed the crime were able to jot down the plate number of the motorcycle. The police are now tracing the ownership of the motorcycle, and have also launched a manhunt for the suspects.

Villarante said they are investigating to determine the motive for the shooting of Gabio. Meanwhile, Mayor Mabilog, through his political liaison officer Jeffrey Celiz, also called on the police to conduct an immediate investigation to solve the case, especially since witnesses got the motorcycle’s plate number.

Gabio was the second Filipino radio journalist shot this year.

This past January Christopher Guarin, a veteran radio commentator and a publisher of Tatak News Nationwide, a community newspaper in southern Philippines, was killed by motorcycle gunmen in full view of  his wife and daughter.

In recent years as the violence against journalists has spiked, the Philippine press launched a national appeal “Don’t
Shoot Journalists”.  But it seems the appeal has fallen on deaf ears.

The Philippine National Police (PNP) has declared an all-out war against gunmen riding in tandem on motorcycles.