Jakarta, Indonesia – For greater than a decade, Mary Jane Veloso has been held in a jail within the Indonesian metropolis of Yogyakarta awaiting execution after being discovered responsible of drug trafficking.
This yr, her household received to see her for the primary time in 5 years.
“Mary Jane has been here in Indonesia for a very long time already. Before Mary Jane’s father and I pass away, we hope that she comes home for her children and she will be the one that takes care of her children,” her mom Celia instructed Al Jazeera.
“It’s been a very long time. We want her back,” she added.
Like many Filipinos, Veloso sought work abroad as a result of the cash was higher than at house.
Leaving her two sons along with her mom, she first went to Dubai the place she spent 9 months as a home employee.
After one other family worker allegedly tried to rape her, Veloso left her job and returned house to the Philippines the place she was approached by a girl named Maria Kristina Sergio who mentioned she had a job for her in Malaysia.
Keen for one more likelihood, Veloso accepted the supply however when she received to Malaysia, she discovered there was no work.
Sergio, her contact, as an alternative prompt Veloso be part of her on a vacation to Indonesia, however when the ladies landed at Yogyakarta’s Adisutjipto Airport in April 2010, officers discovered 2.6kg (5.7 kilos) of heroin in 25-year-old Veloso’s suitcase.
Six months later, she was discovered responsible of drug trafficking and sentenced to loss of life.
Regardless of a tricky line on medication by Indonesian President Joko Widodo, who was first elected in 2014, Veloso has to date managed to flee the firing squad.
She gained a last-minute reprieve in 2015, when seven foreigners and an Indonesian had been executed, after Sergio turned herself in to the Philippines police on allegations of individuals trafficking and the federal government in Manila beneath then President Benigno Aquino requested for Veloso’s case to be reviewed.
As Widodo enters his previous couple of months in workplace, Veloso’s household at the moment are hoping the outgoing president will comply with clemency for the Filipino after, in March, giving a uncommon pardon to a different home employee who had additionally been sentenced to loss of life.
‘Forced to go abroad’
Veloso’s supporters argue she is a sufferer of human trafficking.
In line with the Nationwide Union of Individuals’s Attorneys (NUPL), which is elevating consciousness about Veloso’s case, the medication had been “secretly stashed in a bag given to her by the brother of Tintin’s [Sergio’s] boyfriend in Malaysia without Mary Jane’s knowledge, consent or intention”.
Hailing from Nueva Ecija, north of Manila on the island of Luzon, all the ladies within the Veloso household had been among the many tens of millions of Filipinos working abroad to offer for his or her households.
“Our life is very difficult, it’s very hard, we don’t have much [money] to eat,” their mom Celia Veloso defined. “That’s why we are forced to make a choice to go abroad. All of my daughters, four of them… all worked overseas”.
Mary Jane’s recruiters for the supposed job in Malaysia, Sergio and Julius Lacanilao, had been discovered responsible in January 2020 of working an alleged unlawful recruitment community and sentenced to life in jail.
Veloso has additionally filed a case towards the pair in the identical court docket however has been unable to present testimony as a result of it must be delivered in particular person and he or she can’t accomplish that as a result of whereas being on loss of life row in Indonesia.
“The only barrier right now for that to move forward is for both governments, both Indonesia and the Philippine government, to agree on the technicality… where this testimony will be taken,” mentioned Joanna Concepcion, who chairs Migrante Worldwide, an organisation advocating for Veloso.
Indonesian Ministry of Overseas Affairs spokesperson Teuku Faizasyah instructed Al Jazeera he had not adopted up on the problem and referred inquiries to the Ministry of Legislation and Human Rights.
The legislation ministry spokesperson didn’t reply to Al Jazeera’s questions.
Widodo and former Philippine President Rodrigo Duterte, who took workplace after Aquino, shared the identical hardline strategy to medication, with Duterte main a brutal crackdown, which left hundreds lifeless and is now the topic of an Worldwide Felony Courtroom investigation.
As an alternative of looking for clemency from Indonesia, Widodo mentioned Duterte had given the inexperienced gentle for Veloso’s execution in 2015. The Philippines, which doesn’t use capital punishment, mentioned Duterte had mentioned he would merely respect the judicial course of.
Migrante Worldwide’s Concepcion says there doesn’t appear to have been a lot of a change in strategy since Ferdinand Marcos Jr took workplace in June 2022.
“He continues the same policy and has not publicly said that it would change anything that Duterte had done,” she mentioned.
Indonesia and the Philippines are founding members of the Affiliation of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) and Indonesia was the primary nation Marcos Jr visited after he was elected president..
“Maybe he is playing it safe,” Concepcion added. “It was his first state visit at that time as president, so I’m sure that the agenda items that he would discuss were very carefully planned out, of what specific issues that his first state visit would focus on”.
Within the first two years of Widodo’s first time period, 18 individuals, together with two ladies, had been executed. All had been discovered responsible of drug offences.
Beneath worldwide legislation, the place the loss of life penalty exists, it’s supposed for use just for the “most serious crimes”, a threshold that doesn’t embrace drug crimes.
Amid widespread criticism from nationwide, regional and world human rights defenders, there has not been an execution in Indonesia since July 2016, in line with Afif Abdul Qoyim, coordinator of the Neighborhood Authorized Assist Institute (LBHM), an organisation that campaigns towards the loss of life penalty.
Activists have been calling for a moratorium, however one shouldn’t be formally in place.
“[The president] still can arrange an execution any time he wants, or the next government can also do it in the early part of their reign,” Afif instructed Al Jazeera.
Sustaining strain
Earlier this yr, Jokowi gave clemency to a different feminine migrant employee, Merri Utami, who was virtually executed in 2016.
Despite the fact that Merri Utami’s and Veloso’s instances share some similarities, Afif notes some key variations.
“One of the factors, probably, is the nationality. Merri Utami is Indonesian, while Mary Jane has a foreign nationality,” he defined, including that Indonesia usually tried to counsel that it was foreigners who had been most concerned in drug trafficking.
Nonetheless, Mary Jane Veloso shouldn’t be shedding hope.
Whereas Marcos Jr might appear to have continued the Duterte strategy to the case, on the sidelines of his go to to Indonesia, his Overseas Secretary Enrique Manalo made a request for “executive clemency” for Veloso throughout a gathering along with his Indonesian counterpart Retno Marsudi in Jakarta.
Now Veloso’s authorized group is lodging an enchantment earlier than Widodo leaves workplace.
“The truth is, the first clemency was to SBY [Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono, the Indonesian president from 2004-2014]. Mary Jane never asked clemency to Jokowi,” Veloso’s lawyer Agus Salim instructed Al Jazeera.
The Indonesia normal election is scheduled for February 2024.
“We are going to keep pushing until Widodo formally leaves the office… We’re still hopeful that there are some actions, some development,” Concepcion mentioned.
Veloso’s household is anxiously awaiting developments.
Her eldest son Mark Danielle is now 20 years previous,
“It’s hard to grow up without my mother,” he mentioned. “We really want to be with my mother and be able to see her every day, to see her, to hug her.”