As tears of joy and re­lief streamed down their faces while they em­braced de­tainees re­leased from the East­ern Cor­rec­tion­al Re­ha­bil­i­ta­tion Cen­tre (ECRC), San­ta Rosa, yes­ter­day, rel­a­tives blast­ed the au­thor­i­ties as they ar­gued there was no jus­ti­fi­ca­tion for the State of Emer­gency (SoE).

Heav­i­ly crit­i­cis­ing the Gov­ern­ment and se­cu­ri­ty agen­cies for their ac­tions over the past six months, sev­er­al peo­ple de­scribed it as “to­tal­ly dis­rup­tive,” “un­war­rant­ed,” and “a to­tal fail­ure.”

A moth­er who ar­rived at the ECRC from as ear­ly as 9 am, anx­ious­ly wait­ing for her son to emerge, could bare­ly speak as she wiped tears and said, “It is not jus­ti­fi­able.”