Following the inauguration of Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto on October 20, Migrante International calls on Prabowo to grant clemency and freedom for Mary Jane Veloso at the soonest time possible. We appeal to the new president of Indonesia to protect victims of human trafficking and end the fourteen years of Mary Jane’s suffering on death row and prison.
Mary Jane Veloso comes from a family of poor farmers and is a mother of two. Desperate to provide for her family in a country lacking stable jobs, Veloso accepted an offer to work as a domestic helper in Malaysia but was instead deceived and swindled by illegal recruiters into carrying luggage containing drugs into Indonesia in 2010. Mary Jane was arrested, put on trial in a language that she did not know, and sentenced to death. The global campaign to save her life and widespread protests and clamor in 2015 resulted in the arrest of her traffickers and her scheduled execution was stayed.
Mary Jane is still on death row to this day, her road to freedom fraught with delays in her legal case in the Philippines. Nine years since charges of human trafficking were brought to Mary Jane’s recruiters in Nueva Ecija, no significant progress has been made on the part of the PH government to speed up the process of taking Mary Jane’s testimony in Indonesia to aid in the legal case. Moreover, Marcos Jr. himself failed to appeal directly for clemency for Mary Jane during former President Jokowi’s Manila visit earlier this year. The Marcos Jr. administration must do away with its sluggishness and delays that are tantamount to years of denying justice for Mary Jane. In future talks with Prabowo, the PH government must demonstrate a sense of urgency and political will to secure Mary Jane’s freedom and bring her home to her family.
For fourteen years, Mary Jane and her family have fought with sheer determination to prove her innocence, raising awareness about the struggles of women migrant workers who become victims of human trafficking. It is our hope that President Prabowo will demonstrate compassion and wisdom and set an example of commitment to combating human trafficking in the region of Southeast Asia by granting Mary Jane clemency and immediate release.
We call on migrant, women and human rights advocates all over the world to stand with Mary Jane and her family and join our call in appealing to the new Indonesian government to grant clemency for Mary Jane on humanitarian grounds. Our determination to fight for Mary Jane’s freedom stops with no government in Manila or Jakarta.#
