The BJMP as scapegoat

Frankly, when the beleaguered Bureau of Jail Management and Penology Director, Arturo Alit, was invited to guest at my television show last Thursday, I thought he would be a waste of valuable air time. I fully expected to suffer through another tiresome and self-serving list of excuses rationalizing his agency’s deficiencies in the recent bloody incident at Camp Bagong Diwa in Bicutan.

At the end of the live program, though, I began to think of him as yet another well-educated, sincere career public official trying to do his best under virtually impossible conditions. I now see him as a victim of blabophiliac politicians scrambling for scapegoats to distract the public from their own inaction and incompetence.

I had never met Director Alit before, but I’ve decided to swim against the tide, so to speak, and look carefully at his side. Although he is not entirely blameless, a fact he acknowledges, the finger of recrimination should point not principally at him. It should be pointed directly at national and local officials, and those aforementioned verbally diarrhoeic legislators, who under-fund our local jails and deny them vital resources.

In the forthcoming Congressional investigations of BJMP officials, the ladies and gentlemen of both chambers should also include themselves, Malacanang, the Department of Interior and Local Governments, the Department of Justice, the Philippine National Police, and the mayors of the cities and towns where the local jails are located, among others. All of them have much to answer for.

What is unpardonable, Executive Secretary Ed Ermita, is not the "excuses" the BJMP has been giving for this incident, but the way our government as a whole has been washing its hands, like Pontius Pilate whom we shall be remembering again in the coming Holy Week, of all responsibility for incidents such as Bagong Diwa.

The problem is government’s assumption that once captured and paraded before media, alleged criminals can be totally forgotten and left to literally rot in dilapidated, antiquated hell-holes inappropriately called jails and detention centers, with a P40-peso daily starvation budget for food, in the custody of a severely undermanned, overworked, under-equipped and under-trained contingent of jail guards, there to languish for years before government prosecutors get around to filing cases against them.

When confronted with demands for an explanation of how a "maximum security" facility could be so "lax" as to allow the smuggling of firearms and cell phones, among other contraband, Director Alit’s reply is that Bagong Diwa is a purported "maximum security" facility which isn’t given the resources to implement maximum security. Is that a cop-out, an "excuse?" Well, let’s look at exactly what those resources are.

The BJMP does not run the national penitentiary in Muntinlupa and other correctional institutions under the Department of Justice. But this Bureau is in charge of local prisons all over the country, including those infamous city jails. That means close to 60,000 prisoners in the custody of the Bureau. They are housed in dilapidated, stinking facilities not fit for pigs, let alone human beings. Local jails are typically crammed wall-to-wall with prisoners, most of whom are not provided decent bedding or toilet facilities. On the average, our local jails accommodate up to four or five times their rated capacity.

To watch all these inmates round the clock, accompany them to court hearings and perform other custodial duties, the BJMP has less than 7,000 trained personnel, including employees who do not perform guard duties. At Camp Bagong Diwa, there are only 106 guards for over 1400 detainees, or 35 guards on duty at any given time.

Why weren’t accused terrorists segregated from alleged drug offenders and kidnappers? Because, Alit says, the Camp Bagong Diwa jail doesn’t physically allow for segregation of distinct prisoner groups, much less for the isolation of terrorists or their leaders. The facility was not built to handle accused terrorists. No such special facilities have been constructed since terrorism became a specific concern.

Although overcrowding is a common problem in local jails, there was no lack of space at Bagong Diwa which can accommodate up to three times its present population. However, this facility wasn’t planned to house long-term occupants. There are no separate areas for visitors, for example. Once allowed in, visitors simply mingle with the prisoners. Prison doors are not automated – no jail is in this country, apparently, is – so security is heavily dependent on constantly alert jail guards, a situation which the Abu Sayyaf would-be escapists exploited in the recent incident.

This doesn’t excuse negligence on the part of jail guards, or their failure to comply with established security procedures. But security systems of many jails in other countries do not totally rely on the diligence of guards. They have back-up mechanisms in place such as television monitors and automated doors. Technology eliminates or reduces the risk of human carelessness or error.

Director Alit argues that the Bureau’s budget of P1.9 billion to run the nationwide system of local jails is woefully inadequate. He suggests something like P7 billion to do the job properly and embark on some critical building and repair projects. This must be carefully studied, but local governments should be tapped to provide some of this funding from local taxation. Perhaps, a privatization scheme for local jail management, which is already practiced in some states in the United States, might be considered.

Another major problem is that local jail populations are mostly composed of accused criminals whose cases are in the process of trial or who are detained pending the filing of the cases against them. But most detainees wait years before their cases are filed and finally resolved. In the meantime, they swell our prison populations.

The Department of Justice must launch a deliberate campaign to obtain speedy resolutions of criminal cases. This will significantly reduce the number of detainees, many of whom may be innocent victims themselves.

Director Alit must be held accountable for the deficiencies in the BJMP which may have led or contributed to the failed escape attempt at Camp Bagong Diwa. But it would only be fair to examine where others in government have also failed. Merely looking for scapegoats is a form of escape too, escaping responsibility.