Baby, it’s lonesome inside
‘Contact Visitation’ shall only be available to the immediate family members of the PDLs, with the added provision that the names of the visitors are included in an approved list.
Daily Tribune‘Contact Visitation’ shall only be available to the immediate family members of the PDLs, with the added provision that the names of the visitors are included in an approved list.
Persons deprived of liberty and their loved ones could be singing with gusto Frank Loesser's "Baby, It's Cold Outside" following the heart-warming decision of the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology to allow face-to-face visitation in the detention centers it manages across the country.
Christmas came a few days earlier for the PDLs, thanks to the BJMP as PDLs may now be visited by their respective wives, parents, and children subject to regulations put in place to make the visits orderly, secured, and in keeping with Covid-19 protocols.
Loesser's 1941 song, which has become a Yuletide favorite among men who want their objects of affection to stay the night precisely because "it's cold outside," would be an apt romantic backdrop to such visits if the BJMP officialdom is reading this.
Not that it's stay-indoors cold outside anywhere in the Philippines even in December, but more like it could be arms' length snuggly warm inside BJMP jails with the reunions it has made possible in its facilities where personnel and PDLs are 85 percent vaccinated against Covid-19.
BJMP chief Jail Director Allan Iral said the decision is "an early Christmas gift" to the inmates and their families, "with part of our concern for them being to do everything possible so that they can be with their families as well".
There's a caveat though given the well-known congestion in the majority of BJMP jails — that only 25 percent of the total PDL population of any facility shall be allowed to avail of face-to-face visitation during a visitation day.
So, that means PDLs will have to wait for their turns to be visited either on Tuesday, Wednesday, or Thursday, from 1 to 5 p.m. For Saturday and Sunday, visitations are from 8 a.m. to 12 noon, and 1 until 5 p.m. No visitations would be allowed Monday and Friday as those days are reserved as PDL washdays and to sanitize the entire jail facilities.
That should be fair enough, more than better than not being visited by loved ones at all, especially during what is considered the happiest month of the year — Christmas and New Year's Eve. No PDL is getting visited twice each week, that's for sure, lest others' slots are unused.
According to the BJMP, "Contact Visitation" shall only be available to the immediate family members (what, no girlfriends?) of the PDLs, with the added provision that the names of the visitors are included in an approved list found in the National Monitoring System and PDL Single Carpeta System. Further, the visits should be scheduled, so walk-ins may not be allowed without prior notice.
On the part of the visitors, they must be vaccinated against Covid-19, preferably boosted, and proof of this must be presented if their entry would be greenlighted. For unvaccinated folks, proof must be provided that they've tested negative for Covid through RT-PCR or Antigen test, 24 to 72 hours before entry.
On top of the in-person visits, other modes of visitation such as the E-Dalaw program would continue, something that favors those whose family members live far from the detention facilities. Online visits also help ease the spread of the virus from the visitors to PDLs and vice versa.
There are 477 jail facilities under the BJMP for PDLs with pending cases before the courts, thus we can imagine the challenges that the BJMP leadership has taken upon itself to make the PDLs' Yuletide season more joyful through moments shared with loved ones.
