MANILA – Another hard-hitting Filipino broadcaster was killed Monday by two assassins riding in tandem on a motorcycle in Iriga City some 500 kilometers south of Manila, police said.

Romeo Olea, 49, reporter and commentator of radio station dwEB-FM, is the sixth Filipino journalist killed the past 11 months under the Aquino administration. Olea’s killing occurred 11 months after the murder of another dwEB reporter, Miguel Belen on July 9, 2010.

Chief Superintendent Victor Deona said Olea was on his way to work aboard his motorcycle when the gunmen shot him at 5:50 a.m.  The victim sustained two bullet wounds in his back.

Olea was rushed to the Rinconada Medical Center where he expired.  Investigators recovered two empty 9mm shells at the crime scene.

Olea’s radio program "Anything Goes" dealt with local government and accusations of corruption.

Presidential Communications Operations Office Secretary Herminio Coloma said the Philippine government deplored Olea’s “senseless killing.”

Reports said the killings of media men in the province of Camarines Sur are related to local politics. Local politicians reportedly use some media men, particularly radio broadcasters, to provide public service to their constituents.  But some also indirectly use media men to attack their rivals.

The New York-based Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) condemned the latest killing of Filipino journalists.

“The killing of Romeo Olea must not become just another uninvestigated, unprosecuted death of a journalist in the Philippines,” said Bob Dietz, CPJ’s Asia program coordinator.

“The government must step in to help local police and prosecutors bring Olea’s killers to trial and see the process through to a conviction and sentencing.”

The Philippine National Police (PNP) Press Corps also condemned the latest killing and urged the police and the National Bureau of Investigation to solve the killing of journalists in Bicol region, where seven members of media have been killed since 1986.

Aside from Olea and Belen, the other Bicol newsmen killed were Ronaldo Julian of dzLB in Camarines Sur, Ruel Endrinal of dwRl, Jun Villanueva of dzGB, Dyunyor Joe of dzRC, all from Albay, and Nelson Nadera of Masbate.

Police records show that during the nine-year administration of former President Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo, 39 journalists were killed of which 28 have been solved.

CPJ said that “the Philippines ranked third on CPJ's Impunity Index in 2011, making it one of the worst nations in terms of official reluctance to fight anti-press forces. The index, which calculates unsolved media murders as a percentage of population, highlights countries where journalists are killed regularly and governments fail to solve the crimes."

Only Somalia and Iraq rank worse on the index than the Philippines.