Acceptance of prisoners leads to change: BJMP

TO change for good, prisoners need acceptance from the public, said top officials of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) 7.

“They failed to do good things, which is why we need to strengthen their values,” said Supt. Bartolome Sagadal, assistant director for operations and inmate welfare development chief of BJMP 7.

All prisons and jail facilities are celebrating the weeklong National Correctional Consciousness Week (NCCW) that started last Oct. 22.

The celebration aims to raise public consciousness and awareness within various sectors of society regarding the plight of “persons deprived of liberty.”

“We should not look down on them especially when they re-enter to society. We should not view them as ex-convicts (but) as rehabilitated offenders,” Sagadal said.

Rebuilding lives

Supt. Efren Nemeño said inmates can rebuild their lives again.

Nemeño, assistant director for administration of BJMP 7, assured the public that offenders are properly taken care of.

“We made programs so they will be productive citizens while inside a correctional facility,” he said.

The celebration is mandated in Presidential Proclamation No. 551 of then President Fidel V. Ramos, which declares the last of October as NCCW.

One of these programs aims to empower prisoners to achieve full rehabilitation by making them self-reliant and the jails sustainable.

The program also provides for the legal needs of overstaying inmates or those who have not been scheduled for hearing.

It also promotes livelihood and entrepreneurship, furthers their educational attainment, and establishes linkages outside to sustain their transformation.

Apart from encouraging them to seek religious counseling, the program also promotes fitness and love of arts and culture.

“As the saying goes, we should teach them how to fish so they will have fish throughout their lives.” Sagadal said.