MANILA (UCAN): Authorities in the Philippines have announced long-overdue reforms seeking to end the suffering of inmates in the country’s overcrowded prisons by acquiring more land to build additional facilities.
Jesus Crispin Remulla, the new secretary for Justice, announced on July 21 that the new administration of president, Ferdinand Marcos Jr., would not be “blind to the cries of the persons deprived of liberty.”
Remulla told reporters, “The administration is not deaf and blind to what’s happening inside our prisons. And it is one of the priorities of the Department of Justice, that is, to make our prison facilities more humane, more dignified.”
Saint Paul Prison Care, Inc., a Catholic group that advocates for the rights of prisoners welcomed the planned move. It said in a statement that reforms are needed to offer a solution to overcrowding and other problems faced by immates who are packed like sardines inside prison cells.
There are cases where more than 500 inmates are presently squeezed into a space meant for 170 resulting in poor air ventilation, leading to health problems, the group said.
“More than 60 per cent of our prisoners in the Philippines have or have experienced respiratory problems because of poor air ventilation which makes the air thick and putrid because of the over-population,” the group said. It added it has received reports stating that inmates sleep with their legs and arms overlapping with those of their fellow inmates.
The Philippines has an incarceration rate of about 200 per 100,000 citizens. There are about a thousand prisons running in the Philippines yet they are mismanaged and overcrowded
Amnesty International
“Comfort has been an issue. Our inmate population grew because of the drug war of former president, Rodrigo Duterte. Many became drug suspects, others were killed because of Duterte’s war on drugs,” the group said.
Rights groups have also documented overcrowding and a lack of basic facilities for prisoners.
Remulla said that the new administration would prioritise and tackle overcrowding in prisons by building new ones around the country.
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“The new [Marcos, Jr.’s] administration is aware of the problems in the Philippine prison system. We will do our best to decongest jails because of their overcapacity,” he added.
In 2019, Amnesty International reported that the Philippines had more than 215,000 prisoners.
“The Philippines has an incarceration rate of about 200 per 100,000 citizens. There are about a thousand prisons running in the Philippines yet they are mismanaged and overcrowded,” the Amnesty report noted.
As of May, 2021, the total number of people in prisons across the Philippines reached roughly 117,300, according to Philippine National Police. The majority are incarcerated in jails in the National Capital Region.
However, Remulla said the government has allotted more than 6.7 billion pesos [$934.2 million] to buy land for the construction of new prisons.
“Now we see every person deprived of liberty is not just a number but a real human being that has dignity.”
In a 2020 statement, Catholic bishops’ Commission on Prison Pastoral Care called for an end to overcrowding due to the high infection risk of Covid-19. “With the terrible congestion in our penal institutions, transmission to other inmates is very high and it will be very catastrophic,” the bishops said.
