BuCor asks Senate to institute reforms in jail system

The Bureau of Corrections (BuCor) has appealed to the Senate to immediately institute reforms in the country’s jail system.

In a letter to Senator Manuel Villar, BuCor Director Vicente Vinarao raised the issue of budget concerns and the need to build and improve prison dormitoriesiting, citing congestion in facilities, particularly those housing death penalty inmates.

Villar chairs the committee on public order and security.

"BuCor is maintaining a total of 29,818 inmates. The New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) alone has 18,638 inmates when the normal capacity is only 8,700 inmates. That is a congestion rate of 114 percent," Vinarao pointed out.

On death row, there are 1,205 convicts, 179 of whom already have warrants for execution.

A report by the NBP Superintendent Juanito Leopando noted that "overcongestion of the dormitory assigned to death convicts is a powder keg that could explode unless decongestion of Building I of the NBP is done."

He said construction of an additional building within the maximum security compound "must be undertaken as soon as possible."

Vinarao said the problem is compounded by lack of correctional officers due to Administrative Order 103 and Executive Order 366 that ban or restrict the hiring of custodial personnel.

The ban is imposed although vacancies have incurred due to dismissal, resignation and deaths of custodial personnel.

He likewise reiterated the need to integrate all correctional agencies under a single bureau or department.

"Apart from addressing the perennial problem of congestion by focusing resources only on a single agency that can effect transfer of inmates without unnecessary delays, it would also be good to have a common direction in the implementation of innovative and effective methods of inmate safekeeping and rehabilitation," the BuCor chief said.