South Africa's constitution declares that all people should be treated equally before the law.

South Africa's constitution declares that all people should be treated equally before the law.

And, international law forbids the detention of children.

That said, it is shocking that there should still be courts that practice racism when dealing with offenders.

Prompting our outrage is the report by the Parliamentary oversight committee on correctional services highlighting incidents of blatant racism after their fact-finding visit to the Brandfort and Grootvlei prisons in the Free State last week.

There are still large numbers of black child and juvenile offenders at Grootvlei Medium A prison.

Bails for black offenders are reportedly being set at amounts they cannot afford. White offenders are diverted to rehabilitative programmes while blacks are summarily detained.

The committee also found that jail sentences were severe for black offenders.

This is outrageous.

Racism cannot be tolerated in this era - 14 years into our democracy.

Officials who are still bent on apartheid policies and refuse to adhere to the constitution must be fired.

Some of the values the department of correctional services prides itself with are fairness and equality.

These values can only be achieved if these resistant racists are flushed out and replaced by credible professionals.