SOUTH Africa's prisons are overpopulated by more than 30%, leading to rising incidents of gang violence, poor disease management and general gangster activity.
This was disclosed by senior officials of the department of correctional services during their briefing to the oversight parliamentary committee on what was being done about overcrowding in jails.
The committee heard that while prison overcrowding had dropped from 164% in 2002, prisons were on average 32% overpopulated.
This posed security risks and limited the department's ability to guarantee the constitutional rights of prisoners to adequate accommodation, nutrition, reading material and medical treatment.
Overcrowding also led to "inmate tension and violence", increased risks of communicable diseases, a drop in the ability to deal with inmate complaints and a rise in gang activity, correctional services' chief operating officer Nontsikelelo Jolingana said.
She said gangs used inmate dissatisfaction to "further their own cause and lead protest or violent actions".
The staff to inmate ratio also meant staff and inmates were put in danger and the shift system meant that in some prisons, only half the staff were on duty at a time.
The department was exploring options such as community service for offenders with sentences of less than two years, electronic tagging and actively trying to reduce its numbers of remand detainees to deal with the problem.
Deputy chief commissioner James Smalberger said between 18% and 20% of the 41000 remand detainees could not afford bail, adding to the overcrowding.
And while there was no research showing that overpopulation related directly to negative security incidents, the department's figures showed that in 2012/2013, 43 escapes were recorded, 6884 assaults (up over 30%) and unnatural deaths increased by 26% to 58 from the previous year.
Overcrowding also made it more difficult to separate prisoners. ANC MP Vincent Smith, however, said the department "did itself a disservice" by saying it was difficult to separate prisoners when "a high-profile somebody from inception goes into a separate section".
He questioned why the accused in the Senzo Meyiwa murder was put into the general prison population, while Oscar Pistorius was placed in a hospital cell.
National commissioner Zach Modise said this had been because of Pistorius's disabilities and had little to do with "whether he has or doesn't have money".
He, however, said the parole system needed to be reviewed so controversial decisions like that of the Waterkloof four did not occur.
The committee also heard that the security systems in many prisons, installed in 2005 at a cost of over R200-million, were now obsolete.
A new contract for the upgrading of fences and access control systems at 47 prisons was recently awarded to the Independent Development Trust, which outsourced the electronic security to Tsepa Consulting.
newsdesk@sowetan.co.za
For more stories like this one, be sure to buy the Sowetan newspaper from Mondays to Fridays
Overcrowding limits prisoners' rights
SOUTH Africa's prisons are overpopulated by more than 30%, leading to rising incidents of gang violence, poor disease management and general gangster activity.
This was disclosed by senior officials of the department of correctional services during their briefing to the oversight parliamentary committee on what was being done about overcrowding in jails.
The committee heard that while prison overcrowding had dropped from 164% in 2002, prisons were on average 32% overpopulated.
This posed security risks and limited the department's ability to guarantee the constitutional rights of prisoners to adequate accommodation, nutrition, reading material and medical treatment.
Overcrowding also led to "inmate tension and violence", increased risks of communicable diseases, a drop in the ability to deal with inmate complaints and a rise in gang activity, correctional services' chief operating officer Nontsikelelo Jolingana said.
She said gangs used inmate dissatisfaction to "further their own cause and lead protest or violent actions".
The staff to inmate ratio also meant staff and inmates were put in danger and the shift system meant that in some prisons, only half the staff were on duty at a time.
The department was exploring options such as community service for offenders with sentences of less than two years, electronic tagging and actively trying to reduce its numbers of remand detainees to deal with the problem.
Deputy chief commissioner James Smalberger said between 18% and 20% of the 41000 remand detainees could not afford bail, adding to the overcrowding.
And while there was no research showing that overpopulation related directly to negative security incidents, the department's figures showed that in 2012/2013, 43 escapes were recorded, 6884 assaults (up over 30%) and unnatural deaths increased by 26% to 58 from the previous year.
Overcrowding also made it more difficult to separate prisoners. ANC MP Vincent Smith, however, said the department "did itself a disservice" by saying it was difficult to separate prisoners when "a high-profile somebody from inception goes into a separate section".
He questioned why the accused in the Senzo Meyiwa murder was put into the general prison population, while Oscar Pistorius was placed in a hospital cell.
National commissioner Zach Modise said this had been because of Pistorius's disabilities and had little to do with "whether he has or doesn't have money".
He, however, said the parole system needed to be reviewed so controversial decisions like that of the Waterkloof four did not occur.
The committee also heard that the security systems in many prisons, installed in 2005 at a cost of over R200-million, were now obsolete.
A new contract for the upgrading of fences and access control systems at 47 prisons was recently awarded to the Independent Development Trust, which outsourced the electronic security to Tsepa Consulting.
newsdesk@sowetan.co.za
For more stories like this one, be sure to buy the Sowetan newspaper from Mondays to Fridays
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