EDITORIAL – Lessons from Mary Jane

Mary Jane Veloso finally walked free after getting absolute pardon from President Marcos.

As she rejoins her family and the social mainstream, her travails should impart lessons that will help protect other Filipinos seeking greener pastures overseas.

Tighter monitoring and regulation are needed in labor recruitment, particularly online, along with a broader information program to warn prospective overseas workers of the dangers of ending up in abusive labor conditions, as sex workers or, as in the case of Veloso, as unwitting drug mules.

Stopping human trafficking requires close coordination with law enforcement and immigration authorities in other countries.

Poverty and the lack of opportunities in their own country make people vulnerable to human trafficking. Even people with education and who are not impoverished have fallen prey to recruiters promising high-paying jobs in IT, only to end up forced to work in scam hubs in the lawless borders of Thailand and Cambodia.

Veloso was caught in April 2010 at the Yogyakarta Airport in Indonesia with 2.6 kilos of heroin in her luggage.

In the Philippines, transporting such an amount of prohibited drugs would have warranted life in prison. On Oct. 11, 2010, Indonesia sentenced Veloso to death by firing squad.

From the start, Veloso had maintained that she was unaware that her luggage contained heroin. She said she had been promised a job as a domestic helper in Malaysia by her neighbors Maria Kristina Sergio and Julius Lacanilao. In Malaysia, the two told her that the job was no longer available, and sent her to Indonesia instead, with Lacanilao reportedly providing the suitcase.

Veloso was scheduled for execution in 2015, but received an eleventh-hour reprieve from then Indonesian president Joko Widodo upon the appeal of then president Benigno Aquino III.

In January 2020, Sergio and Lacanilao were sentenced to life in prison by the Nueva Ecija Regional Trial Court and fined P2 million for large-scale illegal recruitment involving three other Filipina workers. But the two have yet to face judgment on the charges related to Veloso.

In 2024, Indonesia granted an appeal from the Marcos administration and allowed Veloso’s transfer to the Philippines to finish her sentence.

Mary Jane’s story is one with a happy ending. This may not be the case for many other Filipinos overseas who are victims of illegal recruitment. But it’s possible to prevent more Filipinos from becoming victims of human trafficking.