By Azer Parrocha/PNA
MANILA — A bloodletting activity will be conducted by the National Press Club (NPC) of the Philippines on Friday to commemorate the 9th year anniversary of the gruesome Maguindanao Massacre where 58 people, 32 of them journalists, were killed.
NPC president Rolando Gonzalo said the club decided to commemorate the massacre by holding a humanitarian activity to be held at the Bulwagang Plaridel in Intramuros, Manila.
Gonzalo said it was also the NPC’s way of supporting the blood donation campaign of the Philippine Red Cross (PRC).
Before the start of the activity, a Holy Mass will be offered in front of the massacre memorial commissioned at the NPC grounds, in memory of the victims.
“Given the positive development, let us make this day of sorrow more meaningful by celebrating life through this bloodletting activity,” Gonzalo said in a press statement.
Meanwhile, he also backed efforts of the administration’s Presidential Task Force on Media Security (PTFoMS), in serving justice to the victims’ kin.
The PTFoMS was formed to address and resolve all forms of violence against all media workers, including those killed in the Maguindanao Massacre.
Gonzalo lauded the efforts of PTFoMS chief and former NPC president, Undersecretary Joel Egco, in forming a special “sub-group” whose sole task is to focus on, and regularly report to the body, the progress of the ongoing court trial.
“Thus far, we have no reason to complain on the government’s handling of the case and so, this year, the NPC resolved to give a new, more positive meaning to this incident, tragic as it may be,” he said.
The bloodletting activity will be supported by the National Capital Region Police Office of the Philippine National Police, Civil Relations Service of the Armed Forces of the Philippines, and Bureau of Jail Management and Penology.
The Department of Environment and Natural Resources, Department of Labor and Employment, Citizen Crime Watch, United Architect of the Philippines – Manila Chapter, and the various press groups in Metro Manila will also support the activity.
Earlier, Malacañang assured that the Department of Justice is doing its best to hasten the prosecution of former Maguindanao mayor Andal “Datu Unsay” Ampatuan Jr., and other accused in the 2009 Maguindanao Massacre.
