First Person: An Elderly Filipino Ex-Prisoner’s Joy at Being Able to “Sleep and Eat”

According to government figures, the number of prisoners is four times higher than its intended capacity, making the Philippines one of the most crowded prison systems in the world along with countries such as the Democratic Republic of Congo, Haiti and Uganda.

But now the Government, with the support of the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), is trying to ease congestion by prioritizing, among other things, the release of older prisoners.

Toto Aquino, 70, spoke with UN News’ Daniel Dickinson at his home in the Pandacan area of ​​Manila.

“I was released two weeks ago and I feel fine. I was incarcerated for eight years, four years in pre-trial detention at the Manila City Jail and four years after my conviction, in Bilibid Prison.

It was very crowded and I slept on a piece of cardboard in a hallway at Bilibid for those four years. I was housed in a maximum security area, 4C-2, with gang members, but I was not a gang member myself. There was a hierarchy within the gangs and that was why I didn’t have a good place to sleep.

We had to go to bed at 6pm every night and wake up at 4am. Every day I ate porridge, coffee, bread and rice and sometimes sausages. This was farm food, the food that prisoners get from the prison kitchen. You can buy other food, but I don’t have any money, so I survive farm.

It’s great to be free! I live with my younger brother in the same house I grew up in with my five siblings. Life is different now because I can eat and sleep whenever I want. I have a comfortable bed and my own room and my brother cooks delicious food.

In prison, I dreamed of chickens. Adobe [Filipino chicken stew] and a comfortable mattress and today I have both; sleeping and eating are now my joy.

Since I got out of prison, I’ve been at home. I feel comfortable here. I sit on a stool in front of my house and watch the neighborhood go by.

I grew up here, so I know my neighbors. Sometimes I sweep the yard and burn trash and I also continue to do 15 push-ups a day, which I started in prison to stay in shape.

I haven’t seen my daughter for ten years. She lives in another part of the country and I hope to see her soon as she is pregnant with her second child.

I think it’s important that people who are convicted serve their sentences, but I also think that releasing old people like me should be a priority. I was released with other old prisoners, but I know men who are 75 years old and still incarcerated.”