KARAPATAN welcomes the filing of a bill at the House of Representatives by the Makabayan bloc representatives which seeks to include fragile health and advanced age as additional grounds for the release on recognizance of indigent prisoners.
Joining Reps. Antonio Tinio of ACT Teachers Partylist and Renee Co of Kabataan Partylist in refiling the bill are human rights advocates as well as newly released detainee Prudencio “Tatay Pruding” Calubid Jr., a retired technician and former overseas worker who, at 81 years old, was wrongfully arrested and detained for six months because he happened to be a namesake of Prudencio Calubid, a consultant of the National Democratic Front of the Philippines with a Php7.8-million bounty on his head. Tatay Pruding was released on June 27, 2025 after the Court of Appeals granted his motion for a writ of habeas corpus. The Office of the Solicitor General has filed a motion for reconsideration on the CA’s decision.
The filing of the bill is likewise part of global efforts to commemorate Nelson Mandela International Day on July 18. Mandela, an anti-apartheid activist and former political prisoner who endured 27 years of incarceration under harsh conditions, was the first black president of South Africa. The United Nations Standard Minimum Rules for the Treatment of Prisoners, a set of international guidelines outlining minimum standards for the treatment of PDL that emphasize respect for their inherent dignity and value, prohibit torture and other cruel, inhuman, or degrading treatment, are likewise known as the Nelson Mandela Rules.
The bill seeks to include fragile health and advanced age as grounds for the release on recognizance of poor prisoners, especially those who are wrongfully accused and are victims of unjust arrests and detention. It seeks to amend the Recognizance Law of 2012. Indigent pregnant or nursing mothers are likewise included as among those qualified for recognizance in the proposed measure.
KARAPATAN said that there are at least 100 sickly and 102 elderly political prisoners in various prisons and detention facilities with subhuman conditions in the Philippines. This includes 80-year old Rosita Taboy, a peasant organizer, who was arbitrarily arrested on May 26, 2023 in San Jose del Monte, Bulacan where she and her husband Antonio Legaspi were long-time residents. Her husband, Antonio Legaspi, died of a heart attack in his jail cell in April 2024. Currently held at the Bulacan provincial jail, Taboy suffers from diabetes and hypertension and finds it difficult to walk without assistance.
The very high jail congestion rates, overcrowded cells, low and corruption-prone budgets, largely inadequate medical facilities and services including reproductive health care, and lack of appropriate environment for sick and elderly prisoners have compounded conditions which led to deaths in detention.
KARAPATAN cited the cases of 24 political prisoners who died while imprisoned in the past nine years – 11 political prisoners during the Duterte administration and 13 in the three years of the Marcos regime.
This includes the case of Antonio Molina, 67-year old cancer-stricken peasant leader who was detained at the Puerto Princesa City Jail in Palawan on trumped-up charges. Citing the Supreme Court’s decision to grant bail to Sen. Juan Ponce Enrile in 2015, his lawyers filed an urgent motion for his release due to the advanced stage of his cancer and the fact that he did not pose a flight risk. He died on November 18, 2021, thirty-four days after a judge denied his motion.
In July 2024, political prisoner and trade union organizer Ernesto Jude Rimando, 58, died due to Stage 4 liver cancer while in detention, after a local court denied his petition for the writ of habeas corpus. In November 2016, peasant organizer Bernabe Ocasla, 66, suffered his third and fatal cardiac arrest while detained. Peasant leader Joseph Canlas, 59, died in March 2011 due to COVID which he acquired in prison, with jail authorities’ disregard for his medical conditions (hypertension and diabetes) when he was arrested and arbitrarily detained.
Urban poor organizer Reina Mae Nasino’s two-month old baby died in October 2020, due to acute gastroenteritis and vulnerable immune system, after the child was separated from her mother due to a court order.
Said Karapatan secretary general Cristina Palabay, “If this bill is passed into law, we hope it will facilitate the release of poor prisoners on humanitarian grounds, especially ailing and elderly political prisoners who not deserve to spend a minute longer behind bars. We also hope that it will rectify the injustices suffered by poor and wrongfully accused persons vis a vis the ease by which the rich and the powerful such as Imelda Marcos and Juan Ponce Enrile are able to avail of legal remedies for their release while facing criminal charges.”
“This measure complements the call to release all political prisoners on just grounds, as all are victims of illegal or arbitrary arrest and detention on trumped up charges. The Marcos regime’s campaign of political persecution of activists, community organizers, peace consultants and ordinary peasants and workers has viciously claimed lives and freedoms,” Palabay said. #
