The Philippines: Murder in Broad Daylight

So commonplace is violence in the southern Mindanao seaport of Zamboanga City that Mayor César Climaco, 68, tallied the killings on a billboard outside the municipal hall. The mayor, a leading critic of the regime of President Ferdinand Marcos, last week became such a statistic himself as he was shot in broad daylight in the center of town. The assassin escaped. Inevitably, some Filipinos blamed the killing on the Marcos regime. During the past two months three opposition figures in the south have been murdered, and many suspect that Mayor Climaco right-wing military elements were involved.

Climaco had been a constant...