In the Metro Manila Jail District (MMJD) at Camp Bagong Diwa, the government has deemed peasant leaders and labor organizers as too notorious to be included in the general prison population. Here, activists with trumped-up charges are segregated and subjected to harsh conditions by the state. Among them are Maoj Maga and Bob Reyes, both detained for years as they await trial.

As political prisoners remain confined in their cells uncertain of their future, a threat looms in the form of the US-based International Criminal Investigative Training Assistance Program (ICITAP). Working with the Philippines since 2006, the program touts its commitment to developing law enforcement institutions, equipped to train police forces and suppress threats of terrorism.

In reality, however, ICITAP’s involvement in Philippine policing and penology only serves to endanger activists and prisoners through its manufacturing of suppression tactics.

Sentenced to Silence

The collusion of ICITAP and the country’s criminal justice system threatens to exacerbate the unjust treatment of political prisoners in the MMJD. 

Presently, the Bureau of Jail Management and Penology (BJMP) plans to transfer MMJD inmates to a new detention facility in Camp Bagong Diwa, which is funded and supported by ICITAP. However, prisoners have rejected the move because of alleged solitary isolation cells located in the building’s seventh floor despite claims by BJMP officers that it will not be used on detainees.

Among the concerned political prisoners is Reyes, 53, who has been detained for six years pending the result of 14 fabricated charges. He worked as a coordinator for Sandigang Manggagawa sa Quezon City—a network organization for private and public sector workers—when he was kidnapped by four armed men who planted a gun and explosive device in his bag. Reyes was then charged by the police with illegal possession of firearms and explosives, later added with multiple cases of murder and arson in locations he had never been to.

Framed similarly was Maga, a 45-year-old organizer for Pagkakaisa ng mga Samahan ng Tsuper at Operators Nationwide, who was accused by the state of murder and arson at Agusan del Sur despite being apprehended at a basketball game in Caloocan. He has now spent six years of his life imprisoned with all charges awaiting trial.

While left in limbo on the status of their cases, political prisoners are subjected to substandard jail conditions. Inmates are offered cheaply sourced and limited food options that barely stave off hunger. In the absence of clean drinking water, they have to filter tap water, which is only available during the morning and evening for two hours, Reyes said.

These circumstances compromise the health of prisoners, further exacerbated by bureaucratic medical services. To gain access to hospital services, a court order must first be granted to an inmate to prove they are in critical condition. For inmates, this means that contracting an illness can be a death sentence, Maga said. 

Alexander Arias, a peasant leader, is among the fatalities of such inhumane policies. Despite complaints of breathing difficulties, Arias was only delivered to the hospital after 19 hours, later suffering a heart attack which led to his death. 

As of June, there are at least 755 political prisoners in the country suffering under the same dire conditions, according to rights group Karapatan. But with the developing relationship between ICITAP and the Philippines, these already grim conditions threaten to worsen as the state and the US further political repression.

Testing Ground  

ICITAP’s involvement in Philippine jails and police serves as an avenue for the US government to hone tactics against dissent. Under the program, workshops have been conducted with the Philippine National Police and the BJMP to support “efforts on countering violent extremism” and “deter prisoners from joining extremist groups.”

Despite its claims of fostering international cooperation, ICITAP seems to only follow the primary reason for its formation during the 1980s: to bolster counterinsurgency efforts and maintain the state’s control. Currently, ICITAP has infiltrated the police forces of more than 100 countries. This is alarming considering that the US is infamous for human rights violations against prisoners accused of terrorism. Inmates in Guantánamo Bay and the Abu Ghraib prison in Iraq were subjected to systematic torture and interrogation by the US government. 

During its occupation, the Philippines was also used by the US as a testing ground for surveillance and counterinsurgency tactics that were later adopted by US policing, according to a book by Alex Vitale, a professor of sociology at Brooklyn College. Such practices reinforce US hegemony by aligning the Philippines’s security apparatus with its counterterrorism and geopolitical interests. 

The ICITAP, then, does not suppress terrorism but rather facilitates it. The only seeming benefactor in this deceptive scheme is the US. Continued partnership will only intensify ongoing political persecution and undermine the Philippines’s sovereignty over its justice system.

Resisting the Regime

Instead of colluding with ICTAP, the Philippine prison system must adhere to humane standards in operating its facilities. Karapatan demands the BJMP uphold the Mandela Rules—the international standard for treating prisoners, which includes the prohibition of solitary confinement and torture.

Along with establishing humane conditions is the assurance of the constitutional right to a speedy trial, which the country has long struggled with. Despite the number of charges against them, difficulties in attaining legal representation have only afforded Maga and Reyes little to no progress on their cases.

Rather than addressing sectoral demands, the government forwards state-sanctioned repression. The state’s weaponization of law enforcement to prosecute those it deems a threat to its power is the reason they are behind bars, said Maga.

Ultimately, allowing a country that perpetrates human rights violations to meddle in Philippine correctional institutions will further jeopardize the rights of Reyes and Maga, along with other inmates vilified as terrorists. Amid intensifying attacks, political prisoners will continually fight for societal change and their release in the face of harassment from the Philippine state and an imperial superpower. ●

First published in the July 28, 2024 print edition of the Collegian.