‘Nothing wrong with studes, inmates being neighbors’

Pasay City officials seem to find nothing wrong with city college students and city jail inmates coexisting in the same compound right behind the city hall.

The Pamantasan ng Lungsod ng Pasay was built 10 years ago, and in all those years, the city government never encountered any problems with the fact that the school building is right beside the city jail, said city administrator Atty. Ernestina Carbajal in an interview with The STAR Thursday. But Carbajal added that it would be Mayor Winceslao Trinidad, who could best answer the question about the unlikely neighbors when he arrives next week from a vacation in the United States.

The city jail was built before the school, Carbajal said.

Last week, city jail warden, Chief Inspector Jaime Silva expressed concern about the location of the city jail, which houses 594 inmates, 15 of whom are foreigners. Without a perimeter fence, the jail poses great danger especially if a jailbreak happens, Silva said.

Silva said his predecessors have requested for land from the city government where a new city jail could be built.

"It’s difficult to find an ideal place here in the city, especially since (Pasay) is densely populated," Carbajal said.

Janet Deriada, officer-in-charge of the city’s Public Information Office (PIO) said the city hall might relocate to the reclamation area owned and developed by the Philippine Estates Authority (PEA).

"The Pamantasan, which was put up for the city’s indigent students, may be transferred to the existing city hall," she said.

In lieu of a better location and with the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology’s (BJMP) "tight budget," Silva has requested the reinforcement of the window grills of several cells and in other parts of the jail.

Silva said that a representative of the BJMP National Capital Region Office had arrived to measure the cell windows to start the window reinforcement project. – Nikko Dizon