QUEZON CITY (PIA) --President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. appointed Jose A. Torres Jr. as the new Director-General of the Philippine Information Agency, as announced by Malacañang on Tuesday. His date of appointment is May 19, 2023.

DG Torres is currently the editor-at-large of the Catholic Asian news site LiCAS.news and also the editorial consultant of Radio Veritas Asia.

He took and finished his Multimedia Journalism studies at the Konrad Adenauer Asian Center for Journalism at the Ateneo de Manila University. He studied Philosophy at the Ecclesiastical Faculty of the University of Santo Tomas and took up Theology at the Loyola School of Theology at the Ateneo de Manila University.

He started his career as a journalist in Philippine News and Feature and later worked as sub-editor for Saudi Gazette. In 1997, he came back to the Philippines and worked as investigative reporter of Isyu news magazine and afterward joined the Manila Times, The Philippine Post, and The Sunday Paper. In 2001, he joined abs-cbnNEWS.com and four years later, joined GMA News Media Inc. He helped set-up GMA News TV.

He revived the tabloid Remate Tonight and set up remate.ph in 2009 and in 2010, joined the Union of Catholic Asian News. He has been with LiCAS.news since March 2020.

He is a Filipino journalist who is also a two-time recipient of Philippines’ National Book Award for Journalism for his books Unholy Nation: Stories from a Gambling Republic (2004) and Into the Mountain: Hostaged by the Abu Sayyaf (2002).

In 1993, he was a fellow at the United Nations World Conference on Human Rights in Vienna and in 2005, he was conferred the Benigno S. Aquino Jr. Fellowships for Professional Development by the Benigno Aquino Foundation and the US Embassy in Manila.

His awards include a citation in the 2004 International Tolerance Prize for his article on Filipino Muslim converts titled Troubled Return of the Faithful and his article, The Making of a Mindanao Mafia, was awarded 3rd Prize in the Jaime V Ongpin Awards for Excellence in Journalism, Explanatory Category, in 2004.

The new director-general also served as the chairman of the National Union of Journalist of the Philippines from 2006 to 2008. He was also the chairman of the Philippine Center for Photojournalism until 2016 and currently sits as board member of the National Press Club of the Philippines. (ARB, PIA-CPSD)