Gwen wants probe into CPDRC mess

Jail making headlines for ‘wrong reasons’ 

CEBU, Philippines - Former Cebu governor and current third district Representative Gwendolyn Garcia is set to file a resolution requesting for a House of Representatives inquiry into the “glaring deficiencies, gross mismanagement and administration” of the Cebu Provincial Detention and Rehabilitation Center (CPDRC).

In a privilege speech yesterday, Garcia said the “deeply troubling developments” inside CPDRC has prompted her to seek an investigation “in aid of legislation.

Garcia, who slammed Governor Hilario Davide III’s management of the CPDRC, which has its fair share of several controver-sies in the past weeks, shared the “sad and sorry state” of the CPDRC before the House of Representatives yesterday.

 She claimed that during her watch as governor, CPDRC became a “world class facility worthy of emulation.”

“That whilst other Philippine jails were hounded by controversies, our provincial jail became an international showcase evoking national pride,” she said.

 She was referring to the world-renowned dancing inmates of CPDRC. The prisoners became world-famous when their video of a dance routine to the tune of Michael Jackson’s “Thriller” went viral in April 2007, garnering over 50 million views.

“Yet here we are, nine years after the Dancing Inmates shot to global fame and wowed the world, and only three years since Davide became governor, the CPDRC is making headlines once more; alas, for all the wrong reasons,” she said.

She said the violations observed inside CPDRC and other pressing and disturbing controversies boil down to the kind of leadership the Capitol has.

Garcia said that in the last two months since President Rodrigo Duterte assumed office, the effort of the government to clean up the National Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa has started to bear fruit, and those responsible for the corruption and abuse inside the National Penitentiary are now being made to account for their sins against the people.

She said the CPDRC, on the other hand, has become “a mockery of Duterte’s efforts” as the facility ended up being hounded by controversies.

 “It is lamentable that instead of inspiring the same in Cebu where we already blazed trail over a decade ago, the vestiges of the past regime—the  lazy, holier-than-thou, do-nothing past—have somehow decided it is in their best interest to reverse our gains and pull us decades backwards,” she alleged.

“Whether by sheer lethargy or by outright compli-city, the current occupant of the Cebu Capitol is derailing our shared desire for a better country. In short, while the country moves forward, Cebu is moving backwards. Regression. Degradation. Degeneration,” she added.

Garcia said a recent raid in which authorities seized shabu, drug paraphernalia, bladed weapons, cellular phones, cash, and other contrabands confirmed how “horribly mismanaged” the CPDRC is.

Aside from this, an inmate, posing as a guest, escaped last July 26. On July 28, former jail consultant Marco Toral, a former inmate himself, fired a warning shot using a blank cartridge when he caught inmates gambling, which is tantamount to disobedience of jail policies. Opening fire in a non-life threatening situation, even with just a blank cartridge, is considered a violation of prison rules. 

Other issues include the death of 10 inmates due to respiratory and cardiovascular diseases, human trafficking and cyber pornography operation inside the jail, the jail personnel’s alleged involvement in smuggling of contraband into the jail like drugs and gadgets, and the renting out of conjugal rooms to generate money, among others.

The Cebu Provincial Board had invited Toral and Jail Warden Romeo Manansala to explain the anomalies in the jail, but the consultant resigned before the conduct of a preliminary hearing. Manansala, on the other hand, showed up during the PB hearing before he, too, resigned and got transferred to the Capitol’s Civil Security Unit.

“All these happened under the current governor’s watch….  Clearly, this is a failure of his leadership,” Garcia said.

 “He simply cannot skirt the issue by suggesting that the provincial jail’s management be transferred to the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology. This is a desperate attempt at deflecting this grave issue without accepting real accountability and responsibility for what has already happened under his watch,” she added.

Garcia also criticized Davide for appointing Toral, an ex-convict whom she said was involved in drug-related crimes.

“When asked why he appointed Toral, Davide’s justification was that he has the experience. Seriously? Obviously Toral had applied this experience in making sure all of the monumental gains we’ve made with the CPDRC are erased… completely wiped out!” Garcia said.

With all the “glaring violations and controversies”, she said it was ironic that Davide was included in the Department of Interior and Local Government’s “honor list” of 10 governors who helped the government in its anti-drug war.

“A number of the governors on the list are my friends, and they deserved to be there. What they do not deserve, though, is to be listed alongside someone so undeserving, so unworthy, so wanting in credibility, that his inclusion renders the entire list suspect,” Garcia said.

She said she had enough of Davide’s “abysmal failure”.

“I can’t be accused of never having given Davide a chance. For more than three years I never criticized him, I never said a word. Despite not being party mates, I made sure he received a proper turn over, a smooth transition, granting him the dignity of his office which his party deprived me of during my last few months as governor right before the 2013 elections. I gave him my 100 percent support. But enough is enough,” she said.

“For how can one be awarded for helping curb the illegal drug trade in the province when the CPDRC has become known as a source of drugs under you watch? You either admit to having tacit knowledge, to being complicit, or to being painfully incompetent and ignorant. Either way it is complete unacceptable,” she said.

Meanwhile, Davide announced that the suspension of visiting privileges at the CPDRC would be lifted on September 5.

But, she said, clustering would be implemented. This means that, for instance, inmates of cells 1 to 25 would only be allowed Mondays as visitation day while the rest of the week would be divided to the inmates of the remaining 94 cells.

Visitors, he said, are only allowed 30 minutes, which means families of the inmates would no longer be allowed to stay overnight in the jail. This is seen to decongest the jail during visitation, which is now from Monday to Sunday instead of the original four-day visitation.

Davide said they will designate a safe area where visitors can stay and that the quadrangle is already off limits to visitors to ensure that no contraband would be brought inside.

He said strict inspections at the entrance and exit points of the jail would be observed and that don’ts and do’s will be posted on walls of the facility.

The inmates’ husbands or wives, on the other hand, can use the conjugal rooms for free. The unauthorized renting of conjugal rooms was one issues inside the jail, with allegations stating that Toral earned as much as P20,000 to P30,000 per month from the rent that was reportedly neither remitted to the government nor used for the improvement of jail facilities.

Davide suspended visitation privileges of inmates following Arnel Mait’s escape. Among those who suffered was alleged drug lord Alvaro Alvaro alias Barok, who was recently reported would be rescued by his colleagues in the illegal drug trade.

In response, Chief Superintendent Noli Taliño, Police Regional Office-7 director, dared them to make the attempt.

“Subukan nila na i-rescue,” he said, revealing that two teams from the Provincial Public Safety Company (PPSC) and the Cebu Provincial Police Office (CPPO) are now in the jail to augment security there.

“Ubusin natin if lumaban sila sa police. Kaya mas mabuti na mag-surrender nalang sila,” Taliño said. (FREEMAN)