DIGOS CITY, Philippines – It was mid-morning Friday and preparations for the burial of journalist Napoleon Salaysay -- one of the 64 killed in the Maguindanao massacre -- was being done.

At a corner of the Salaysay house in Barangay (Village) Goma here, Monet, the journalist’s widow was talking to the Philippine Daily Inquirer when a relative came in and informed her that the top glass of her husband’s coffin had just cracked.

“My husband is crying for justice,” was Monet’s immediate reaction to the information.

Salaysay, editor of the Cotabato City-based Mindanao Gazette, was part of the convoy of some 30 journalists and members of the Mangudadatu family and their supporters held hostage by a group of armed men allegedly led by Datu Unsay, Maguindanao Mayor Andal Ampatuan Jr in the morning of Nov. 23 in Barangay Salman in Ampatuan town, Maguindanao.

The victims – many of them women - were all unarmed and were on their way to Shariff Aguak town to file the certificate of candidacy of Buluan Vice-Mayor Esmael Mangudadatu for the gubernatorial race against a member of the Ampatuan family.

Salaysay’s bullet-riddled body and that of the other members of the convoy were found strewn on a grassy hill in the same town a few hours later. The other victims were dug up from shallow graves along with at least three vehicles.

The mass murder was so gruesome – with the victims mostly shot in the face – that it drew condemnation from across the globe.

November 23 was declared by journalists as the day of national infamy.

“He was the most evil of all evils,” Monet said of Andal Jr., the main suspect in the carnage now known as the Maguindanao massacre.

Monet, speaking in the vernacular, did not hide her anger when she added: “if I were to decide on his fate, I would have him burned on a stake," in an apparent reference to the old Christian practice of punishing individuals accused of being heretics or evil practitioners.

Monet welcomed the filing of charges against Andal Jr. but said it was not enough.

“I want to pour gasoline over his body and light him up,” Monet added while clinching her teeth.

Salaysay, 57, was finally laid to rest on a vacant lot near the family house in Sitio Napan in Barangay Goma here late Friday, a day ahead of his scheduled burial.

Chief Inspector Anthony Padua, city police director, said the family decided to bury the journalist a day earlier because his corpse had started to deteriorate.

He left behind three children, including an 18-year-old son, who has special learning needs.

In General Santos City, Manila Bulletin reporter Bong Reblando’s body will be buried on Dec. 5, according to his family.

But the family of the 10 other journalists killed in the carnage, whose bodies lie in a funeral parlor in General Santos City, said they were still deciding when to hold a mass burial for their loved ones.

As this developed, support for the families of the journalists killed in Maguindanao continues to flow in.

Aside from pledging to shoulder the expenses for the burial of the slain journalists, Sarangani Governor Miguel Dominguez said the provincial government has decided to give P100,000 to the victims’ families.

He said businessmen in Sarangani also vowed to help.

In Kidapawan City in North Cotabato, black became the official color of newsrooms as the media community continued to grieve for their slain colleagues.

Malu Cadelina-Manar, president of the National Union of Journalist in the Philippines (NUJP) Kidapawan chapter, said journalists started wearing black shirts, ribbons and armbands in condemning the massacre.

“We are one in condemning the suspects and the mastermind of these gruesome killings. We also appeal to the government to prosecute the perpetrators to give justice to those who died,” Felsy Co, news correspondent of X-FM in Mlang, North Cotabato said.

Bishop Romulo Dela Cruz of the Diocese of Kidapawan also celebrated mass for the victims of the Maguindanao carnage on Sunday.

In Iligan City, journalists are not only mourning but have started re-training themselves on election reporting.

“After what happened in Maguindanao last week, we wanted to equip local journalists with the necessary tools in covering the 2010 elections,” Ryan Rosauro, executive director of the Peace and Conflict Journalists’ Network (Pecojon), said.

NUJP Iligan Chapter president Richelieu Umel, who has been covering high-risk areas in Northern Mindanao for the Inquirer like Rosauro, said the training was timely.

Just like the Autonomous Region in Muslim Mindanao (ARMM), Northern Mindanao has several areas of concern in connection with next year’s polls because of feuding politicians. (Orlando Dinoy, Aquiles Zonio, Williamor Magbanua and Cong Corrales, Inquirer Mindanao)