Two gunmen on a motorcycle shot and killed journalist Joselito Agustin, a reporter and anchorman for the Filipino radio station DZJC Aksyon Radyo, on his way home on Wednesday in Laoag city.

Agustin’s killing is the second murder of a journalist in the Philippines within 24 hours.

On Monday evening, Desidario Camangyan of Sunshine FM Radio was shot dead while hosting a village singing competition in the southern Philippines.

Both Camangyan and Agustin were reported to have been vocal in criticizing graft and corruption in the country.

Speaking to IPI by phone, Melinda Quintos de Jesus, Executive Director of the Center for Media Freedom and Responsibility in the Philippines [CMFR], said: “As these killings increase, public awareness of press freedom issues increases. Police forces and journalist coalitions, in particular, are now becoming much more aware of deaths involving journalists on the national scale.”

The Philippines was the most deadly country for journalists in 2009, according to IPI’s World Press Freedom Review, with 38 journalists killed – 32 of them massacred as they accompanied family members of gubernatorial candidate and local mayor Esmael Mangudadatu in a convoy in the southern province of Maguindanao, on a trip to an election office to file his candidacy papers.

In the Philippines, the killers of journalists are rarely caught or punished. Many politicians have their own private security forces and political violence is common.

IPI Director David Dadge said: “Although charges have been brought in the case of the 32 journalists slain last year, the Philippines must do much more to roll back the tide of impunity which protects the killers of journalists. These two murders must be investigated and the assassins prosecuted. The failure to consistently bring to justice the killers of journalists creates a climate in which they feel free to strike again and again.”

More information on IPI’s Death Watch count can be found here.