Radio broadcaster Julito “Jaz” Calo was fatally shot on March 20, 2026, outside his residence in La Castellana, a municipality in Negros Occidental, Philippines.
Calo, 49 years old, co-hosted a program on DNN News FM in Himamaylan City and worked for the local government of Negros Occidental. The attack occurred while he was tending to his garden. An unidentified gunman opened fire and fled immediately after. Despite being rushed to a nearby hospital, Calo was pronounced dead on arrival.
With authorities still searching for suspects and a clear motive behind the attack, Calo’s murder has reignited serious concerns about the safety of journalists and the state of press freedom in the Philippines.
Calo is the ninth radio journalist killed since President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. took office on June 30, 2022.
The National Union of Journalists of the Philippines-Negros Island Region (NUJP-NIR) said Calo’s murder is not an isolated incident but part of a growing trend of attacks on media workers across the country. The organization emphasized that too many journalists have lost their lives while on duty, stressing that many of these cases remain unresolved, with perpetrators evading justice.
The killing of journalist Percival “Percy Lapid” Mabasa in October 2022 further highlights this ongoing culture of impunity in the Philippines, with former Bureau of Corrections director Gerald Bantag, his deputy, and several inmates charged in the case. Despite a 2-million-peso reward for information leading to his arrest, Bantag remains at large.
A recent Supreme Court ruling in favor of the news organization Rappler represented a positive step for press freedom, upholding its Filipino-owned status and ending a protracted legal dispute viewed by advocates as an attempt to suppress critical journalism.
Photo © Raffy Lerma