Human Rights Online Philippines

On the OSG Comment to the SC Petition for the Release of Prisoners

The confirmed death of one Bilibid inmate from #COVID19 dramatizes the urgency of our Supreme Court petition to release the most vulnerable during the COVID-19 health crisis. No lockdown or even quarantine measures at this stage can contain the outbreak of the disease and rescue congested prisons.

The OSG’s summary dismissal of our SC petition in this regard is the height of callousness and disregard for human life.

The OSG Comment became a platform for attacking the Left instead of addressing the plight of the elderly and the sick, including a 21-year old prisoner afflicted with leprosy and a 6-month pregnant woman. This petition, while initiated by families of political prisoners, is meant to help ALL prisoners at risk from the COVID-19 pandemic which is now invading prison facilities.

Human rights lawyers know how much I campaigned hard to get them to file a court petition very early on for the humanitarian release not only of my husband Vic Ladlad but ALL other at-risk prisoners, be they political prisoners or ordinary prisoners. We families of political prisoners were very happy when the NUPL and PILC lawyers heeded our appeal and FLAG also submitted recommendations to the High Court.

But the OSG knee-jerk reaction only saw RED when they made their reply, in effect consigning every prisoner to a death sentence of COVID-19. Kahit isa man sanang salita na pag-unawa, wala. Walang puso, walang awa. Ano hinihintay nila, mas marami pang mamatay bago sila gumalaw?

Now, the fate of our Petition rests in the hands of the Supreme Court. We pray for compassion and humanity where there were NONE from the OSG.

Reference: Fides Lim
Spokesperson, KAPATID
Email: kapatid.pp@gmail.com
Facebook: kapatid.politicalprisoners

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KAPATID, which means brother/sister in the Philippine language, is an organization of families and friends of political prisoners in the Philippines that works for their release and the protection of their rights and welfare.

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