The government, in cooperation with the Supreme Court (SC) and various stakeholders, is spearheading a jail decongestion summit in Manila to come up with comprehensive analysis of the country’s penal system and address prison congestion problem in the country.
In a press briefing in Malacañang on Friday, Justice Assistance Secretary Jose Dominic Clavano said among those who will join the December 6 to 7 summit at the Diamond Hotel will be representatives from the Department of the Interior and Local Government (DILG), Department of Justice (DOJ), Supreme Court, and other stakeholders.
“We hope that we are able to reach the mission of the jail decongestion summit with the help of course of the UNODC as well as GOJUST who will be funding the event, two-day event where we will have stakeholders, experts, and several government agencies represented,” Clavano said.
Clavano said President Ferdinand R. Marcos Jr. will be attending the event with Executive Secretary Lucas Bersamin, Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri and Speaker Martin Romualdez.
The DOJ official said there will be three proposed activities and strategies during the summit. These include reducing prison admissions, increasing the release of inmates upon completion of their sentences and expanding jail facility capacity.
“So, we will have short-term goals as well as long-term goals which we hope to discuss and thoroughly analyze in the jail decongestion summit,” Clavano said, noting these include rules on custodial hearings and requiring bail.
Through the jail decongestion summit, Clavano said they want come up with measures to reduce jail admission as well as increase releases, considering for instance various classifications of women in conflict with the law (WICL).
He said the penal system has to deal with minor offenders, sexually and physically abused women, which is in line with the government’s anti-violence against women campaign. There are also pregnant WICLs, nursing WICLs, women with disabilities and elderly female prisoners.
The justice official said the SC, the DOJ, and the DILG will be coordinating to come up with new rules on WICLs and a manual on how to deal on their situation.
Based on a December 2021 survey, there were 199,079 inmates or persons deprived of liberty (PDLs). There are about 179 PDLs per 100,000 people in the population.
Some 13,704 of these PDLs are females that equals to 11 percent of the total Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) jail population, according to Clavano.
“Significantly, 69.51 percent of the PDLs are undergoing preventive detention, which means there has not been a decision or conviction in their cases and only 30.49 percent have been convicted and sentenced,” he explained.
The BJMP handles those under pre-conviction, while the Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) has jurisdiction over those convicted offenders.
Another significant statistics, Clavano said, is that 70 percent of BJMP detention facilities are already overcrowded at an average congestion rate of 386 percent.
He cited the Quezon City Male Dormitory, which is considered the highest in terms of congestion rate at 1,330 percent.
“Another significant factor here as to why we are holding the summit is that the BJMP facilities for female PDLs are more overcrowded than facilities for male PDLs,” he added. PND
