It is a generally an accepted fact that overcrowding in our country’s prisons towers above all major challenges that paralyze effective service delivery for the Prisons department. Albeit the fact that the prisons were designed with a holding capacity of about 5 500 inmates, the current number of inmates in the country’s prisons fluctuates between 14 000 to 15 000, almost triple the recommended holding capacity, a development that is not only worrisome, but also hazardous to prisoners health.
Inadequate infrastructure, high crime and re-offending rates are some of the contributing factors to congestion. Among other things, congestion leads to poor sanitation and spread of communicable diseases thereby posing threat to lives of inmates.
Several schools of thoughts allude to the fact that due to lack of vocational skills that may enable released inmates to engage in various income generating activities, ex-inmates fail to cope up with the economic environment. Consequently, in a bid to cope up with the ever-changing socio-economic demands, many of them resort into dubious and illegal ways of earning a living that eventually translate into re-offending as the means to make the ends meet automatically contravene or fall into the conflict with the supreme laws of the land.
It is against this background that MPS intensifies rehabilitation and reformation programmes in prisons to prepare inmates to be responsible and productive citizens of the land by inculcating into them survival skills.
Just recently, the projects office at prisons headquarters introduced block making training to inmates at Zomba Central Prison as an additional reformatory activity The training specifically aims at equipping inmates with skills in moulding blocks which require the use of cement and sand or quarry dust.
National Prisons Projects Officer Senior Superintendent Maxwell Kamowa said the training was vital to the inmates as they were being prepared to become block makers after being released from the prison.
According to Kamowa, block making using cement and sand or quarry dust is a trade that has over suddenly become marketable and lucrative as the government of Malawi encourages cemented bricks as a way of conserving the environment unlike the conventional bricks that devastate the environment. He further said that inmates need to be equipped with several rehabilitative skills at least now that MPS has shifted from being a punitive to a correctional institution which has included reformation and rehabilitation of inmates to its core functions.
“As one of the reformation programmes being offered by Malawi Prisons Service to ensure that inmates have something to do in their communities after completion of their sentences, the training is very vital because inmates are equipped with hands-on skills and knowledge” . Kamowa explained
The Projects Officer also expressed dismay over the tendency of some communities who resist the reintegration of inmates who had just finished serving their sentences based on the stereotypical conviction that a hyena is a hyena, literally insinuating that offenders cannot change from their immoral behaviours. Kamowa assured the citizenry that MPS is working around the clock in ensuring the complete metamorphosis of inmates from irresponsible citizens to fully-fledged responsible citizens upon release, hence calling upon members of the community to jovially accept them when they rejoin the society.
One of the beneficiaries of the training, Leonard Kungade an inmate at ZCP said he was privileged to have that chance of learning new skills in block making which he failed to attain while he was outside the bars.
“Honestly, I have gained a lot of skills and knowledge in block making and I promise to effectively utilize such skills when I rejoin the community. I have now come to terms with my sentence and I am a changed person who is ready to make amends for my wrong doing by positively contributing to the socio-economic development of the country” said the seemingly happy Kungade
He therefore applauded the good move by the MPS in introducing such training as it is one of the agents for change among inmates. However, he asked for more support from government and non-governmental organizations in terms of providing them with working materials as starter pack after release.
Apart from block making MPS also conducts rehabilitation and reformation activities such as tailoring, carpentry, electrical installation, welding and fabrication, modern farming methods, motor vehicle mechanics among others across the country’s prisons