Gabriel “Kumander Aguila” Alburo, a radio broadcaster in Guihulngan City, Negros Oriental, Philippines, was shot dead by two unidentified gunmen last Friday.

Alburo, 50, hosted the morning show ‘Pagmata na Commander’ on 94.5 dyJL FM – a community radio station.

He is the second radio broadcaster to be killed in Negros Oriental this year after Edmund Sestoso in Dumaguete on April 30.

He was riding home on a motorcycle after watching a cockfight, when he was shot by two men on another motorcycle on the national highway.

The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines (NUJP) condemned the killing of Alburo, who was running as an independent candidate for councilor in Guihulngan.

According to Senior Superintendent Raul Tacaca, director of Negros Oriental Police Provincial Office,  Alburo figured in a verbal altercation with somebody over a cockfighting bet, but they were also looking at other angles as the motive of the incident.

“If proven to be work-related, his death brings to 13 the number of journalists killed since President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office in mid-2016 and 186 since 1986,” the NUJP said. 

In a report published in early December, the International Federation of Journalists said the Philippines was the worst in impunity in Southeast Asia.

Another international media watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) recorded three journalist deaths in the Philippines last year, compared to four in 2017.

However, the Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism recorded four journalist deaths in 2018.

The IFJ called the Philippines the “deadliest peacetime country for journalists,” with a total of 185 killed since the People Power Revolution in 1986.