THIS morning, I received a text message from a friend based in Baguio City. I'm translating the text: "Update from those who visited Chandu. He's OK now. Can communicate. Hope he'll pull through." That was the uplifting part, but the text ended: "Alice's burial on Friday." Chandu is Dr. Constancio Claver, a physician working in the Cordilleras and chair of the Bayan Muna party-list group in Kalinga province. Last Monday, his family was ambushed by armed men on board two vans. Chandu and a bystander suffered gunshot wounds and both are now recovering. Sandy, their 7-year-old daughter, was in the van and was spared but suffers from shock. Alice, Chandu's wife, died from her wounds.
2 activists, 1 media man killed in 3 hours (tags)
THE latest wave of activist and media killings on Monday hit three regions, including Metro Manila, within a span of three hours, claiming three lives. The first killing happened about 6 a.m. at a bus terminal in Zone 2, Bulan town in Sorsogon, where Rei Mon Guran, a 21-year-old 2nd-year political science student was gunned down. Guran was the local spokesman for the League of Filipino Students and a student of Aquinas University of Legazpi City. In the Cordillera region, the Bayanmuna Kalinga chapter chairman, Dr. Constancio Claver, and his wife Alice Claver, a coordinator for the same group, were ambushed about 7 a.m. Monday by heavily armed men in a black Delica van. The attack killed Claver’s wife, who died while undergoing treatment at the Kalinga Provincial Hospital. She suffered bullet wounds in the head and neck. In Metro Manila Tanod tabloid photojournalist Vic Melendres was gunned down about 8:45 a.m. near his home inside the Gozun Compound in Letre, Malabon, while on his way to work.