Everybody's business
In Bilibid, prison authorities say new personalities have taken over a drug trade that shouldn't have had any reason to exist in, of all places, the national penitentiary. Not only does the drug trade continue to exist, it is actually flourishing and thriving. It appears that all the measures taken to wipe out the problem have all been for naught.
In Cebu City, a similar problem exists at the Cebu Provincial Jail. Illegal drugs continue to flow in, along with every conceivable sort of illegal item. It would appear that the facility is trying very hard, if not to catch up with Bilibid, at least to emulate it. In the world of crime, there is a perverted sense of honor in trying to be like the big stars.
Many have often wondered why it is so hard to stamp out something in a contained space. There is nowhere anyone could go in a prison except within its walled confines. No one can go out without authority and no one can get in without permission. Everything that comes and goes is subject to inspection. Everyone inside has been documented, assessed, and otherwise scrutinized.
And yet, for all that has been done to control, monitor and shape life in these concrete aquariums, there is still no end to the travesties that somehow, and quite incredibly, just cannot give government control freaks their peace of mind. Everyday something happens that is not supposed to happen. Prisons are simply running roughshod over authority. Why is this happening?
When you want to tame a mighty river and harness its great power for the benefit of many, you build a dam. When you want to deter the threat from an unfriendly nuclear-powered bully in the neighborhood, you surround yourself with even more and bigger nukes. Somebody once said that if God did not exist, somebody would have invented Him. All I am saying is that if anyone truly wanted to do something, he could.
So, in answer to the question why problems over in Bilibid and right here in Cebu's provincial jail just can never seem to stop, it is not because the problems are insurmountable but because the people who are supposed to stop them do not want to stop them. If they want to stop the problems, they could. Nothing is beyond the realm of possibility.
The next time anyone gets really serious and starts researching the problem, it would serve his cause well if he starts with the authorities. Forget the jail inmates or their relatives, friends and associates. Even if they wanted to, they really could not do anything if the authorities are dead serious in doing their jobs. If anything happens, it is because someone in authority allowed it to happen.
It is time we stop all this bellyaching about things getting out of hand in the country's penal institutions. Let us not pretend we do not know anything about how things are allowed to happen. Prisons are not the world outside where anything can happen behind a mountain or underneath the sea. Everything is within confines. Everybody knows everybody else. A drug deal, like a fart, is nobody's big secret. If it is a business, it is everybody's business.
‘Stop all this bellyaching
about things getting out of hand in the country's penal institutions. Let us not
pretend we do not know anything about how things are
allowed to happen.’