Bishop: RP jails defeat rehabilitation goals

Despite government promises to improve prison conditions, overcrowded, under-funded and filthy Philippine jails remain hellish for inmates, a Catholic bishop lamented. Palawan Bishop Pedro Arigo said such inhuman conditions defeat the purpose of prisons to rehabilitate criminals who are detained there. “Looking at our jails, it’s a hellhole," lamented Arigo, who chairs the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines prison ministry. He said the current situation is “alarming" and threatens to wipe out any chance to rehabilitate inmates. “If the situation is like that, it’s hard to expect that people inside prison be rehabilitated. The purpose of correction can never be served," he said. Arigo said effective measures must be taken to ensure prison conditions are consistent with the ideal standards at all stages of detention, even as he called on government to “rethink" its position on justice system which is dominantly punitive instead of being rehabilitative or restorative. “We have to rethink our current criminal justice system and think of other alternatives the Christian way," he said. The Catholic Church has been advocating “restorative justice" which gives emphasis on restitution rather than retribution. Restorative justice is concerned neither with blame and punishment nor with forgiving and forgetting but telling, repenting, forgiving and healing, he said. “The goal of restorative justice is to change wrongdoers and, insofar as possible, to make wrongs right," he said. - LBG, GMANews.TV