Ka-Blog!

"Ito ang ating sama-samang krusada para sa tunay na paglilingkod bayan.  Bayan muna bago ang sarili.  Paglingkuran ang sambayanan…NGAYON NA, BAYAN!"
       This slogan has been on air for exactly five years.  Since February 26, 2001, a few weeks ater People Power 2, Ngayon Na, Bayan! served the Filipino people without fail.  Except when the station is hooked up on a television station or its owner has declared a holiday, NNB offered an alternative radio program that aired the deepest and most sacred of our people’s aspirations–national soverignty, national industrialization, genuine agrarian reform, democracy, respect for human rights, nationalist and scientific culture, among many others.
     In its five years of broadcast, it has been awarded a KBP Golden Dove Award as best public service radio program in Metro Manila in 2002 and it has been a consistent finalist in the Catholic Mass Media Awards from 2001 to 2005.  One of its co-hosts as well as one of its reporters has recently been accepted into the Konrad Adanauer Center for Journalism Program for Radio.  And despite its carrier station having a weak 10,000 khz signal, it remained among the top five most listened to programs on its time slot.
        Many of its regular resource persons have been martyred for espousing the interests of the Filipino people–Eden Marcellana, Eddie Gumanoy, Ricardo Ramos, Councilor Abel Ladera, Fr. William Tadena, Diosdado "Ka Fort" Fortuna and many others.  Some of its most ardent listeners have been abducted and have remained missing, like Danny Macapagal of Nueva Ecija.      
       This is hardly surprising.  Even though they wouldn’t care to admit it, NNB is closely being listened to by the ISAFP, the CIDG, the shadowy ANAD, even Malacanang itself.
       And we were not the least surprised when we received a call last Friday from the DZRJ-AM management that our program is suspended "until further notice."  Before The Daily Tribune and Abante, Ngayon Na, Bayan! was the first "media casulaty" of gma’s Proclamation 1017.  And while both the Tribune and Abante will bounce back from these attacks (with added prestige), I am not sure whether NNB will ever go back on air again.
        At 3:30 this afternoon, I received a text message from Kodao Productions Radio Cluster head Dee Ayroso that DZRJ-AM has announced that two of its reporters shall soon take over our time slot.  Pending our meeting with the station owner on Monday, nothing is yet final.  But, like the hundreds of progressive martyrs and the entire Filipino people, NNB has fallen victim to gma’s murder of the people’s democratic rights.      
       I am sad beyond words.  But we will wear this attack against our program and the people’s right to free speech as a badge of honor we will take to our graves.
       Ms Sonia Capio and her co-hosts like myself will soon find other radio programs to produce and work in.  But already, I miss NNB.      
       Mabuhay ang Ngayon Na, Bayan! Mabuhay ang nakikibakang sambayanang Pilipino!