MARY JANE VELOSO, FOUR PRESIDENTS, AND SIXTEEN YEARS SHE CANNOT GET BACK

Mary Jane Veloso was 25 years old when she arrived at the airport in Yogyakarta, Indonesia, on April 25, 2010.

Customs officers found 2.6 kilograms of heroin hidden inside the luggage she was carrying. Mary Jane has maintained for the past sixteen years that she did not know the drugs were there.

On September 24, 2026, President Ferdinand Marcos Jr. signed her absolute pardon.

Mary Jane is now 41.

Twenty-five.

Forty-one.

Sixteen years disappeared between those two ages.

GLORIA MACAPAGAL-ARROYO

Mary Jane was arrested during the final months of Gloria Macapagal-Arroyo's presidency.

The problem that eventually swallowed Mary Jane's life was already known to the Philippine government.

On February 8, 2010, more than two months before Mary Jane's arrest, Arroyo issued Administrative Order No. 279 creating an inter-agency task force specifically to prevent Filipinos from being recruited as drug couriers by international trafficking syndicates.

The order described Filipinos being "enticed, duped, and subsequently recruited" as international drug couriers, with some eventually receiving death sentences abroad.

Mary Jane was arrested on April 25.

She eventually told her family that she was in jail in May. Her family sought government assistance in August, by which time Arroyo had already left Malacañang and Benigno Aquino III had become president.

Arroyo's government had identified the danger before Mary Jane's arrest. Her case soon became an example of the problem the government was already trying to address.

BENIGNO AQUINO III

Aquino inherited the case when Mary Jane was still 25.

In October 2010, an Indonesian court sentenced her to death. The Philippine Embassy appealed, and government funds were used to hire private Indonesian lawyers for her.

Indonesia's appellate court and Supreme Court eventually upheld the sentence.

Aquino personally sought clemency from Indonesian President Susilo Bambang Yudhoyono in 2011.

After Joko Widodo became president, the Philippine government continued seeking relief.

By April 2015, Mary Jane had been transferred to Nusakambangan, the island prison where Indonesia carried out executions.

She was 30 years old.

Eight other prisoners were scheduled to die with her.

Then Maria Cristina Sergio, the woman Mary Jane identified as the person who recruited her, surrendered to authorities in the Philippines.

Philippine prosecutors were pursuing cases involving human trafficking, illegal recruitment and estafa. Mary Jane could be a witness.

Aquino made another appeal to Widodo.

The Philippine government argued that Mary Jane's testimony was needed in the criminal case involving the people accused of recruiting her.

Indonesia stopped the execution.

Eight other prisoners were executed that night.

Mary Jane lived.

Aquino's government had pursued appeals for years, and its final intervention came during the most dangerous hours of Mary Jane's life.

She remained in prison, but she was alive.

RODRIGO DUTERTE

Rodrigo Duterte inherited a woman who was still under a death sentence in Indonesia.

His presidency created an uncomfortable contrast because Duterte had built much of his political identity around an aggressive campaign against illegal drugs.

When Duterte met Widodo in Indonesia in September 2016, Mary Jane's case was discussed privately.

Reports later emerged in Indonesia claiming Duterte had effectively told Widodo that he would respect whatever Indonesia decided, which some interpreted as a "go-ahead" for the execution.

The Duterte administration disputed that interpretation.

Duterte publicly said the Philippines would respect Indonesia's judicial process. Palace spokesperson Ernesto Abella later said Duterte had not given a green light for Mary Jane's execution and that the government would pursue clemency if necessary.

Meanwhile, the Philippine government continued pursuing the prosecution of Sergio and Julius Lacanilao.

A legal problem remained. Mary Jane was imprisoned in Indonesia and could not simply appear in a Philippine courtroom.

The Office of the Solicitor General fought for a way to allow her testimony.

In 2019, the Supreme Court ruled that Mary Jane could testify through deposition by written interrogatories. The Court reaffirmed that ruling in 2022.

Duterte left office with Mary Jane still in Indonesia.

FERDINAND MARCOS JR.

When Ferdinand Marcos Jr. became president in 2022, Mary Jane had already spent twelve years in Indonesian custody.

His administration again sought clemency.

The case moved in a different direction after Prabowo Subianto became president of Indonesia.

Indonesia began negotiating transfers involving foreign prisoners, and the Philippines reached an agreement allowing Mary Jane to return home.

On December 17, 2024, Indonesian authorities turned her over to Philippine officials.

She arrived in Manila on December 18.

She was 39 years old.

The transfer did not erase her conviction. She remained a prisoner and continued serving her sentence in the Philippines.

Then, on September 24, 2026, Marcos signed her absolute pardon.

After more than sixteen years in detention, Mary Jane could finally leave prison.

THE YEARS SHE LOST

Mary Jane was 25 when she was arrested.

Think about your own life at 25.

Then imagine leaving the country because you believe there is work waiting for you, carrying a suitcase that will change everything.

Mary Jane's account has remained that she did not know heroin had been concealed inside the luggage. The Philippine Supreme Court, in decisions dealing with the prosecution of Sergio and Lacanilao, recorded her account of having been recruited through a false promise of overseas employment and being given the luggage she later carried into Indonesia.

The criminal cases involving her alleged recruiters have taken years themselves.

Sergio and Lacanilao were convicted in 2020 in a separate large-scale illegal recruitment case involving other complainants. The cases directly connected to Mary Jane involve qualified trafficking, illegal recruitment and estafa.

Mary Jane finally testified personally in June 2026.

Sixteen years had passed since her arrest.

There is still a legal distinction we should respect.

Mary Jane's claim that she was deceived does not authorize us to pronounce the defendants guilty in the pending cases involving her. Courts decide criminal liability.

What cannot be disputed is the time Mary Jane lost.

She nearly faced a firing squad at 30.

She returned to the Philippines at 39.

She received an absolute pardon at 41.

Her sons grew up while she was in prison.

In April 2015, when their mother was preparing for what everyone feared would be their final goodbye, they were 12 and 6 years old.

By the time she returned to the Philippines, they were young men.

Mary Jane said in 2024 that she had spent almost fifteen years separated from her children and had not been able to watch them grow up.

That is the cost that no legal document can calculate.

FOUR PRESIDENTS

There will naturally be arguments over which administration deserves credit.

Mary Jane's story is larger than that contest.

Arroyo's government had already recognized the recruitment of Filipino drug couriers as a serious national problem before Mary Jane was arrested.

Aquino's government pursued appeals through the Indonesian legal system and diplomatic channels, and its intervention preceded the 2015 reprieve.

Duterte's government continued the prosecution involving her alleged recruiters, while government lawyers successfully fought for her ability to testify despite her imprisonment abroad.

Marcos secured the agreement that brought her back to Philippine custody, then granted her absolute pardon.

Four administrations handled different parts of the same case.

Mary Jane carried the cost throughout all of them.

SIXTEEN YEARS

A pardon can free a prisoner.

It cannot return lost time.

Mary Jane cannot watch her sons grow up a second time.

She cannot redo her thirties.

She cannot erase the night in 2015 when she was preparing to die while eight other condemned prisoners were taken out and executed.

She is 41 years old now.

The woman who carried that suitcase was 25.

Sixteen years stand between them.