The Bureau of Corrections will introduce a cashless coverage in all its working prisons and penal farms (OPPFs) in September to remove the proliferation of unlawful actions that use money.
BuCor Director General Gregorio Catapang Jr. defined in a Sunday assertion that individual disadvantaged of liberty (PDLs) are allowed to own cash whereas serving a sentence, both from proceeds of their engagement in work and livelihood packages or from cash despatched to them by kinfolk and associates, to complement the restricted assets allotted for his or her fundamental wants.
However, as a result of the BuCor acquired studies that some PDLs used their cash in unlawful business transactions, Catapang stated all OPPFs would change into “cashless zones.”
“By this we mean, PDLs and even corrections officers assigned to man the security compound will not be allowed to carry cash money or else it will be confiscated,” Catapang added.
Confiscated cash from PDLs shall be deposited to the PDL’s belief fund, whereas confiscated cash from corrections officers or COs could be deposited to the workers belief fund.
Instead of money, the BuCor would challenge PDLs booklets, just like what banks challenge, reflecting the quantity credited to the booklet holder’s title and entitling the PDL to buy items or gadgets from the IPX, a retailer inside prisons.
They are allowed to obtain a most of P2,000 per week.
Catapang warned that any unauthorized BuCor personnel discovered to be in possession of a PDL’s booklet would “be meted outright dismissal.”
“With the new policy, we are hitting two birds with one stone. One is eradicating the use of cash money in illegal business transactions of PDLs, and two, we will be able to discipline our own personnel from meddling with PDL’s money,” stated the BuCor chief.
Meanwhile, Catapang needed the provision and operation of IPXs inside OPPFs managed by BuCor cooperatives, of which each worker is a member.
Proceeds from this operation shall be deposited on to an worker’s funds as a part of their incentives.
The mechanics for these are actually being crafted by the BuCor Business Center, headed by Atty. Melencio Faustino. — DVM, GMA Integrated News
Source: www.gmanetwork.com
