Philippine journalist who covered Duterte’s war on drugs shot dead in store

Jesus Malabanan was a correspondent for the Manila Standard and a stringer for Reuters, contributing to its Pulitzer Prize-winning reporting on the drug war

He is the 22nd journalist killed in the Southeast Asian country since Rodrigo Duterte became president in 2016

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A journalist holds a sign during a 2020 protest about media freedom in the Philippines. Photo: AP

Published: 4:00pm, 9 Dec 2021

A journalist who helped cover Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte’s war on drugs campaign for an international news agency was shot dead while watching TV in a store, in a brazen attack in what has long been regarded as one of the world’s most dangerous countries for journalists.

Jesus Malabanan, 58, a provincial correspondent for the Manila Standard newspaper, died while being transported to a hospital after being shot once in the head by one of two motorcycle-riding men on Wednesday night at a family store he was tending in Calbayog city in Samar province, police and officials said on Thursday.

The suspects escaped and a police investigation is under way to identify them and a motive for the attack.

Media watchdog groups condemned the killing, including Malabanan’s colleagues in Pampanga, a province north of Manila where he was based and worked for years as a news correspondent and as a stringer for Reuters.

“Jess helped Reuters a lot in the drug war stories that won a Pulitzer in 2018,” said Manny Mogato, a retired correspondent of the international news agency who was part of the Manila team that worked on the award-winning reports.

Malabanan is the 22nd journalist killed in the Southeast Asian country since Duterte became president in 2016, based on a count by the National Union of Journalist of the Philippines.