Philippine prison hosted a Dota tournament for inmates

A prison in the Philippines recently hosted a Dota tournament for its prisoners, making it one of the first, if not the first, prison in the world to host an esport tournament. The feedback was so positive that there may be more tournaments from the prison soon.

Behind the prison walls of the Baguio City Jail Management and Penology in Baguio, in the Philippines things got extremely exciting recently when the prison hosted the first Dota tournament for incarcerated people. It was probably the first time in the world that an esports tournament was held in a prison.

Dota tournament held in Philippine prison

The tournament was first reported by “95.7 Brigada News FM Koronadal”, which published pictures of the competition. The pictures show several male prisoners wearing yellow t-shirts, competing in Dota on small PCs placed on old desks. These images have since spread around the world, provoking various reactions. By and large, though, the reactions have been very positive.

On the images, you can see the prison inmates playing Warcraft 3: Dota. This is probably because, unlike Dota 2, Warcraft 3 Dota doesn’t require an Internet connection to play on LAN. It also probably runs smoother on older hardware.

Community praises the handling of the inmates

Many commented that this is quite a humane way to treat prisoners and praised the prison authorities. As many know for sure, prison here in Europe is not comparable to prisons in other parts of the world. Especially in Manila, the capital of the Philippines, prisons are often in poor condition and often hopelessly overcrowded. The inmates are sometimes crammed together and there is unfortunately often a lack of privacy, hygienic conditions or psychological care.

Therefore, the news of an esport tournament in a Philippine prison comes as a surprise. Perhaps it was due to the prison and its management that such a tournament could take place. The prison seems to have a great interest in keeping the inmates well and also offers various painting, art, charcoal drawing, and singing competitions to improve the inmates’ well-being. DOTA players were even rewarded for their skills in the prison tournament and given small awards.

Because the response was so good and the community gave very good feedback overall, we can possibly assume that there will be more small tournaments of this kind in the future and maybe even other prisons will join in.

Header: 95.7 Brigada News FM Koronadal