MANILA, Philippines — Corrections Director General Gregorio Catapang Jr. has replaced the guards manning the New Bilibid Prison’s Maximum Security Compound after he received reports of misdeameanors while on duty.
State-run PTV4 also reported that Catapang, a former military general, also assigned Supt. Purification Hari as the NBP MaxSeCom chief, replacing CInsp. Lucio Guevarra, who was acting superintendent..
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MaxSeCom houses inmates serving prison sentences of longer than 20 years.
In his speech during the ceremonies on Wednesday morning, Catapang said that the 700 prison guards who were replaced will undergo re-training and will be assigned to other prison and penal farms.
The training, which will be in a classroom setup, will also include a refresher on the rules and regulations of the bureau. It will be conducted by international prison reforms expert Prof. Raymund Narag of Southern Illinois University.
Catapang said he has not seen improvement in their handling of MaxSeCom. "I still receive information of misdemeanors," he also said, adding that some of them also do not go on duty but have someone sign their attendance.
Replacing them are 300 prison guards who will be provided with bodycams.
Despite the smaller number of new prison guards to man the MaxSeCom, Catapang said he is confident this is enough since their work will be augmented by technology such as monitoring through CCTV.
Vowing that he will continue pursuing reforms at the bureau, Catapang added in Filipino: I won’t accept any excuses, but just to make sure that we are all in the same page, we will review all rules and regulations of BuCor, so we all understand each other.)
“We are on a reform mode and we are to reform our institution within five years,” he added. — Kristine Joy Patag