MANILA — The Catholic bishops’ migrants ministry welcomed the absolute pardon granted to former overseas Filipino worker Mary Jane Veloso, ending nearly 15 years of detention in connection with her drug-trafficking conviction in Indonesia.
READ: Marcos pardons drug convict Mary Jane Veloso
Bishop Socrates Mesiona, chairman of the CBCP Episcopal Commission for the Pastoral Care of Migrants and Itinerant People, said Veloso and her family had endured years of hardship.
“We are happy that Mary Jane Veloso has been granted an absolute pardon. We know that she and her family have gone through a lot,” Mesiona said Sept. 27 on the sidelines of the 40th National Migrants’ Sunday in Quezon City.
President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed Veloso’s absolute pardon Sept. 24, ending her imprisonment after she was convicted of carrying 2.6 kilograms of heroin through an Indonesian airport in 2010.
Veloso, now 41 and a mother of two, has maintained that she was deceived by recruiters into carrying the drugs.
She received a last-minute reprieve from execution in 2015 after the Philippine government asked Indonesia to allow her to testify against her alleged traffickers.
Veloso returned to the Philippines in December 2024 after Manila and Jakarta agreed to let her serve the remainder of her sentence in the country.
A day after her pardon, Veloso attended a Thanksgiving Mass with her family at St. Catherine of Siena Chapel in Quezon City.
Mesiona also expressed gratitude to those who worked for Veloso’s freedom and return to her family.
“We are grateful to those who took steps to help and free someone like Mary Jane Veloso,” he said.
Bishop Gerardo Alminaza, president of Caritas Philippines, also welcomed Veloso’s return, saying her ordeal should remind authorities to protect vulnerable migrant workers.
“Mary Jane Veloso is home at last. What a long and painful journey it has been,” Alminaza said.
“May this homecoming bring healing and renewed hope to her and her family. And may no one ever have to endure what she has gone through,” he said.
