UNKNOWN to many, the New Bilibid Prisons (NBP) in Muntinlupa City (Metro Manila) is equipped with surveillance cameras.
Despite their presence, however, contrabands still slip into jail cells.
You may wonder how and why irregularities thrive inside NBP’s 10-hectare maximum-security compound, where hardcore criminals are supposed to undergo rehabilitation in preparation for their reintegration into society.
Closed-circuit television (CCTV) cameras are installed not only in strategic areas like gates—the control gate included—but all over the national penitentiary.
A CCTV monitoring camera is even located right inside the NBP director’s office.
But how come these cameras have no record of contrabands such as illegal drugs, deadly weapons and electronic appliances entering the facility?
“Every two days, the memory of the CCTV is deleted. And the one supervising the CCTV does not report to the [NBP] director the contrabands caught by the cameras,” an informant told The Manila Times on Monday.
According to him, this scheme would not thrive without the blessing of NBP and Bureau of Corrections officials.
“To regularly erase the content of the CCTV and leave no traces of evidence that contrabands do enter the compound . . . huge amounts of money [are] given regularly to” these officials, The Times source said.
About P25,000 is given weekly and P1 million monthly to these officials, he added.
CCTV cameras were purchased during the term of former corrections bureau director Ricardo Macala in 2001.
But during a telephone interview also on Monday, former Armed Forces of the Philippines Chief of Staff Gen. Dionisio Santiago, the chief of the corrections bureau from June 2003 to September 2004, admitted that he could not remember if these cameras were used during his tenure.
“I could not recall [if] we were using [the] CCTV surveillance system,” Santiago told The Times.
According to him, he found out during his term that an employee was operating a convenience store while a doctor had a pharmacy store.
Worse, the supplies in the drugstore were taken from the supplies of the hospital, said the former military chief.
Santiago, who spent a month in Israel studying its jail system, offered several suggestions on how to eliminate corruption at the national penitentiary and in penal colonies.
“We should eliminate special treatment. Put in the necessary funds and train the prison staff,” he said.
“Food should be cooked well and distributed properly. Have a central dining area. Eliminate the gang system. Give inmates their basic needs like clothing [and] good beds. Give them worthwhile jobs,” the former corrections bureau chief added.
He also suggested also the establishment of a training school for prison guards and officials.
“Perhaps we can have an academy just like the Philippine Military Academy for soldiers and the Philippine National Police Academy for police officers,” Santiago said.
By Jaime Pilapil, The Manila Times
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