No handcuffs, body armor for Mary Jane Veloso in homecoming — BuCor

Convicted Overseas Filipino Worker Mary Jane Veloso will not be handcuffed or required to wear body armor in her much awaited return to the Philippines early Wednesday, the Bureau of Corrections said on Tuesday.

According to Emil Sumangil’s report in 24 Oras, Veloso will leave for the Soekarno–Hatta International Airport in Jakarta at 8 p.m (Indonesian time) where she will meet members of the media.

She will afterwards board a commercial flight and upon her arrival in Manila at around 6 a.m. will be brought directly to the Correctional Institution for Women in Mandaluyong City for a five-day quarantine.

“Ang instruction, huwag na sa airport, kasi alam niyo naman busy ang airport, holiday. We will be distracting, disrupting the operation, so we want a smooth transfer,” said BuCor Director General Gregorio Catapang.

(The instruction was not to do it in the airport, especially because it is busy there right now due to the holidays. We might be distracting or disrupting their operations, so we want a smooth transfer.)

Veloso is currently at the Women's Correctional Facility in Jakarta as she waits for her homecoming just in time for Christmas.

Karsiwen Kabar Bumi, an Indonesian member of a non-government organization who helped the former Filipina death row inmate, shared with GMA Integrated News some of the artworks that Veloso made such as batik art.

“It is very happy, for me, myself and for our organization because it is 10 years already. It’s really touching me because every year I visit her in Jakarta,” said Bumi.

Bumi added that Veloso is already prepared to leave the detention on the way to the airport. 

But before she leaves, Wen shared that Veloso requested the detention facility’s management to allow her play volleyball a final time with her friends. 

Veloso was sentenced to death for drug trafficking after she was caught with 2.6 kilos of heroin in Indonesia in 2010.

She reunited with her family after five years last June 2023 when they visited her in Yogyakarta.

Last November, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr.  said  Manila and Jakarta reached an agreement to transfer Veloso to the Philippines, thanking new Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto and his government for their goodwill.

But Veloso will only meet her family after her quarantine.

“Kung mata-transport siya ngayon, so may countdown tayo na five days, tamang tama sa bisperas ng Pasko, pwede yun, whole day yun,” said Catapang.

(If she will be transported tonight, we have a five-day countdown and that would be in time for Christmas eve, so her family could visit her the whole day.)

Even after the quarantine, BuCor said Veloso will still have to stay at the correctional facility for 50 days based on its guidelines.

It is also unclear if Marcos will grant Veloso pardon once she arrives in the Philippines. But the chief executive welcomed her impending return. —Vince Angelo Ferreras/RF, GMA Integrated News