Duterte appeals to NPA: Free jail warden within 72 hours

DAVAO CITY—Mayor Rodrigo Duterte appealed to the communist New People’s Army (NPA) to release within 72 hours the provincial jail warden captured in Panabo City last Dec. 23.

Jose Mervin Coquilla, the warden of Compostela Valley Provincial Rehabilitation Center, was nabbed by communist guerrillas outside of his home for his alleged “willful negligence in the supervision of inmates and his direct and indirect, overt and covert participation [in] drug trade and drug use inside the jail,” according to Ka Aris Francisco, spokesperson of the NPA ComVal-North Davao South Agusan Subregional Command.

Duterte said it would be timely to release Coquilla today as a gift because it is the warden’s birthday.

“I cannot promise you tomorrow but what I can promise is that I can get him within the next 72 hours. I will demand for his release,” Duterte said in a news conference on Sunday.

“Otherwise, I will be forced to go to you, bringing with me his wife and children. You choose, I will bring his family there or you will release him,” he added.

Duterte, however, said he was not defending Coquilla from the accusations of the NPA.

“I am not saying it is a lie but it is not yet proven. You have the right to be heard,” Duterte said.

Francisco said in a statement that Coquilla siphoned off funds from the allocated prison budget.

“According to the complaints received by the NPA, Coquilla’s corruption has resulted in the inadequate medical and health care and food provision for inmates. To exercise absolute and fascist control, Coquilla’s guards allegedly perpetrate physical abuse on their prisoners. Coquilla has also purportedly maintained double standards and discriminatory practices. He supposedly imposes strict and inhumane regulations for visiting families who are forced to talk to their loved ones while behind bars. But he allegedly turns a blind eye to inmates who were caught using illegal drugs, and to jail guards who were involved in ferreting drugs inside the prison cells,” Francisco claimed.

But Francisco explained that the warden “is presumed innocent until proven guilty beyond reasonable doubt, and as such, is being treated leniently and humanely by the NPA custodial force, for as long as guerrilla conditions warrant.”

Duterte, through his good relations based on mutual respect with the communist movement, has consistently facilitated the release of policemen and soldiers captured by communist guerrillas in Mindanao. Karlos Manlupig, Inquirer Mindanao