Immediately release Filipino political prisoners and end detention and ill-treatment of curfew violators

Geneva, 6 April 2020

The Government of the Philippines should immediately release political prisoners and avoid using detention sentences for violations related to lockdown orders, as decongesting Filipino prisons becomes crucial to avert a public health crisis.

Philippines authorities must immediately and unconditionally release political and at-risk prisoners, if the loss of thousands of lives and a public health crisis is to be avoided.

Interior Secretary Eduardo Año declared last month that jails under the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology are 100% safe from COVID-19. But with severe overcrowding, poor hygienic and sanitation conditions, limited or no access to health care, inadequate ventilation and lack of clean water, Philippines jails seem more like a ticking time bomb waiting to blow up if urgent measures are not immediately taken.

The OMCT has repeatedly denounced the inhumane conditions in Filipino prisons. As of 19 March 2020, the country’s prison facilities had overstretched to accommodate 534% of their normal capacity,[1] becoming the most overcrowded prison systems in the world. In these conditions, any physical distancing between detainees is impossible and diseases like coronavirus are likely to spread like wildfire.

According to medical reports, only at the New Bilibid Prison in Muntinlupa City, 5,200 inmates die annually due to overcrowding, disease and violence.

Among those whose lives are at stake are 609 unjustly detained political prisoners. Forty-seven of them are elderly and 63 are sick. Many suffer with life-threatening and debilitating illnesses. Ms. Ge-Ann Perez, Mr. Frank Fernandez, Ms. Cleofe Lagtapon, Ms. Moreta Alegre, Mr. Jesús Alegre, Ms. Virginia Villamor, Ms. Reina Mae Ina Nacino and Mr. Gerardo dela Peña are at imminent risk due to their serious health conditions.

They should be freed as a matter of priority. Recently, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights Ms. Bachelet, addressing the response of States to the COVID-19 pandemic, called for the release of every person detained without sufficient legal basis, including political prisoners and others detained simply for expressing critical or dissenting views.

Given the already extreme prison overcrowding, it is particularly alarming that the Government is imposing prison sentences to enforce quarantine restrictions put in place in response to the pandemic. As of today, over 20,000 people have been arrested for violations related to lockdown and curfew orders, including for violating social distancing and quarantine regulations.

In some instances, those violating the lockdown were also subject to abuse and ill-treatment. Human rights groups reported episodes of police and local officials confining those arrested in dog cages and forcing them to sit in the sun for hours.

On Wednesday, in a televised address President Duterte ordered the police, military and local officials to shoot dead anyone who “creates trouble” during the lockdown. We remind the Duterte administration that resorting to deadly and unchecked force as a response to the COVID-19 emergency is unlawful, disproportionate and unnecessary.

The lockdown has already disproportionately impacted the poorest and marginalized communities; the Government should be giving urgent support to them, instead of ordering to “send them to the grave”.

We urge the Government of the Philippines to:

• Publicly retract the order to shoot-to-kill and immediately cease any incitement to violence against those violating lockdown and curfew orders;
• Immediately start decongesting prisons and unconditionally release all arbitrarily detained political prisoners;
• Take all necessary steps to ensure that adequate measures to protect the rights of all prisoners are put in place, such as mass testing and screening of all detainees and the confinement of at-risk inmates to ensure the safety of all prisoners and prison staff; the implementation of alternative measures to prison visits (e.g. video conferencing, more telephone access) and; the provision of adequate food and health care to all inmates;
• Ensure that measures taken in response to the coronavirus emergency are lawful, proportionate, necessary and non-discriminatory;
• Refrain from imposing jail sentences for violations related to coronavirus lockdown measures;
• Take appropriate measures to prevent the use of extra-custodial use of force, torture or ill-treatment against lockdown violators and to ensure that all allegations of such violations are promptly, thoroughly and impartially investigated.

The World Organisation Against Torture (OMCT) is the largest global NGO group actively standing up to torture and protecting human rights defenders worldwide. It has more than 200 members in 90 countries. Its international Secretariat is based in Geneva, Switzerland.

For more information, please contact :

Iolanda Jaquemet, Director of Communications

ij@omct.org,

+41 79 539 41 06

Stella Anastasia, Human Rights Adviser & Network Coordinator

sa@omct.org

[1] https://www.icrc.org/en/document/philippines-amidst-covid-19-outbreak-icrc-focuses-one-most-vulnerable-places-prisons