New rules, better accommodations up in P70M IRC 

By Florence F. Hibionada

A home away from home. 

Well, almost, or so as promised and designed as the Province of Iloilo gears up for the November transfer to the new Iloilo Rehabilitation Center (IRC).  Located in Barangay Nanga, Pototan, Iloilo, this latest infrastructure project of the Iloilo Provincial Government is pegged at P70 million.

And there are to be new rules, better accommodations and real room for rehabilitation to Ilonggo criminals averaging about 790 in IRC custody.  Current number is 791 with a high recorded weeks back of 800. 

In an interview, retired P/Supt. Juan Mabugat, IRC warden told The News Today, all is ready for the forthcoming and much-awaited transfer. 

In fact, future needs of additional jail security to augment the present force of 86 provincial guards have been made.  Supt. Mabugat is optimistic of affirmative action by January. 

There will also be new sets of anti-riot gears for jail security and more uniforms for inmates who will be ‘dressed' in coded colors representing their IRC identification.  And foreseen as well is the budget requirement which he said, will certainly double alongside the need for three more vehicles for transport of the IRC inmates in Court appearances and shipment of Ilonggo convicts. 

The budget increase will not translate though to more food expense allocation as meals in the IRC will remain at P30 a day covering three meals.  Expectedly, the bigger and better center will have to gear up for more electricity, logistics and miscellaneous expenses. 

“The total land area is 15 hectares but our building is only about 1 hectare,” Supt. Mabugat explained. 

“We will have standard cells that will comfortably house eight to twelve inmates in each cell. We will have a clear division of the juveniles, women inmates and the men in the group.  There is a total of 64 cells for these.  The transfer will  be done once there is full construction of the security fence, it would be cyclone wire with barbed-wire and is 12 feet high.  We will see an inner and outer security fence with some 6 meter-gap in between.  And arrangements are underway for the creation of a ward in the Pototan Provincial Hospital for the exclusive use of IRC inmates in the event they are out for hospital confinement.”

Will the P70 million IRC then be ‘hi-tech'?

Not quite, retorted Supt. Mabugat yet it would certainly be “substantial and sufficient.”  This, he added, will see a lot of surveillance cameras, a more comfortable and useful lawyers' lounge and better visitors' area.  The new rules for visitation will also see procedural changes however the ever established conjugal visits stay as practiced.

And to complete the new ‘look' for the IRC, Supt. Mabugat would one day want to have at least two K-9 sniffing dogs.