MANILA (PNA) -- The detention center of the Bureau of Immigration (BI) in Bicutan, Taguig, was recently cited for successfully transforming itself into a facility that promotes the welfare of its inmates, it was reported Wednesday.

A television documentary entitled “Our Man in Manila” made its debut via German cable station DW-TV recently detailing the plight of some foreigners who traveled to the Philippines and ended up being preyed upon by extortion syndicates.

The documentary, dubbed in German and English languages, was aired in over 200 countries, including the Philippines.

The program host, German engineer Alfred Lehnert, said the documentary featured the experiences of former detainees at the Bicutan jail who fell prey to notorious syndicates that made their lives very difficult while in detention during previous administration.

Lehnert commended the present BI leadership under Immigration Commissioner Marcelino Libanan for effecting the changes and instituting the prison reforms that inmates at the Bicutan jail now enjoy.

A former BI detainee himself, Lehnert recalled how previously arrested foreigners were harassed by corrupt immigration officials through unjustified detention and indiscriminate filing of deportation cases.

Lehnert, a civil engineer from Hamburg, claimed that he himself lost millions of pesos to the “opportunist mafia.”

However, instead of buying his freedom, he said he fought for his rights until he was cleared of his cases and eventually released after languishing in jail for 18 months.

Lehnert later led the advocacy for the cause of other jailed foreigners by organizing the Foreign Assistance Center (FAC) which helped facilitate the release of innocent detainees without paying anything.

Lehnert hailed Libanan for helping him pursue his advocacy on behalf of the detainees while encouraging more tourists to visit and invest in the country.

The cases of many of the inmates, he pointed out, were resolved and disposed during the term of Libanan who made decongesting the Bicutan jail one of his highest priority programs since becoming BI chief in May 2007.

“Commissioner Libnanan should be credited for doing a good job, from more than 200 foreign detainees when he assumed office, their number has dwindled then to only 65,” Lehnert said.

With Libanan’s aggressive decongestion program, Bicutan detention facility has presently a record low number of inmates at 58.

The documentary film also featured the physical changes that have taken place at the Bicutan jail under the present dispensation, including its spic and span facilities and orderliness. (PNA)