Halalan 2022: The Bilibid Situation - Policy Question for the Presidentiables

Part 5 of a Series In this upcoming elections in the Philippines, what are the agenda of the presidential candidates in relation to issues and concerns of our criminal justice system. We hope that as voters, we include these concerns as we choose who will lead our nation.

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The New Bilibid Prison (NBP) is an explosive issue that Presidents of the Philippines will grapple with once they are in office. The NBP issue is sensationalized by the media (and social media) and creates a potential embarrassment for any sitting President. Issues of drug trade, VIP treatment, gang riots, "big time" inmates lording over other inmates, hotel-type amenities, such as jacuzzis, will instigate controversies, not only for the BuCor Director and Secretary of Justice, but also in Malacanang, where they are charged as grossly incompetent and/ or implicated as hidden partners in the corruption and malfeasance happening inside the penitentiary. Whoever sits in Malacanang will face the same problem. The NBP problem is multi-faceted and it takes more than a knee-jerk reaction to overcome it. Killing drug dealers already imprisoned, restricting the movements of the prisoners and putting them in oppressive lockdowns, placing police officers, such as the Special Action Force (SAF) to guard the perimeters, are interventions that are not sustainable--prisoners will simply mutate and discover new ways to beat the system. Galugad or shakedowns, destroying of kubols, and transfers of gang leaders to far-away facilities may disrupt the operations momentarily but will resume once a new equilibrium in the balance of power emerges. The problem of Bilibid can be summarized as structural, organizational and cultural in nature. Structurally, it is overcrowded, undermanned and under-resourced. With a population of 26,000 inmates, it is the biggest mega prison in the world, an inmate population that is inherently criminogenic. One prison guard is tasked to supervise as much as 500 inmates, a far cry from the 1:7 ratio mandated by the BuCor Modernization Law. Due to the structural limitations, the organizational capacity of the personnel is compromised, forcing them to utilize indigenous coping practices such as the use of the mayores, trustee, coordinator, kubol, tarima, VIP, talipapa, and pangkat systems. Inmates develop a mechanism to manage their own cells, solve their own conflicts, and address their own problems. While this is organizationally helpful in the short-run, it keeps the Bilibid from collapse, it has long term negative repercussions to the management of the Bilibid. The more powerful and socially connected become Mayores and VIPs, and enjoy the big kubols and other amenities, which eventually replicate the inequalities and favoritism in the Philippine society. Of course, these dynamics breed power struggles among gang leaders, and conflicts with the corrupted prison guards (who are few but nonetheless influential), which eventually translate to gang wars, drug trade and use, VIP treatment, etc., and that are now commonly sensationalized in the media. All of these translate to a cultural dynamics where law abiding inmates and prison officers are kept to the sidelines, and seldom speak, for speaking out may mean the loss of lives and limbs. Prison officers who dare question the inner workings of the corrupt are easily transferred to distant penal colonies, their retirement benefits threatened, and they could even be charged, ironically, for "corruption."

Thus, a sustainable reform is the only acceptable solution for the Bilibid problem. The structural deficiencies must be addressed by hiring more prison officers, improving the dilapidated facilities, and putting the necessary operational resources. The 28,000 population Bilibid can also be broken down in to smaller manageable regional prisons, where each region can have its own prison facility. Furthermore, alternatives to incarceration, especially for first time minor offenders must maximized to avoid prison congestion. The principles of effective prison management must be adopted by the BuCor, where risk assessments, proper housing assignments, appropriate programming for the inmates, and case management to document their performance will be introduced. This way, the mayores system can be transfored into a shared governance model where their good contributions are maximized and their excesses curtailed. Finally, a program for professionalism and cultural sensitivity should be introduced to address the embedded corruption that makes a mockery on the efforts of so many honest workers in the BuCor. There are current efforts to improve the competency of the BuCor staff-- continuous training and morale development-- and all these should be supported by the future president. For the presidentiables, these are evidence and theory based solutions to an enduring problem, a product of decades-long research and advocacy to improve the correctional system. A knee jerk solution will simply make the problem worse.