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| Time to install CCTV |
| By sowetanlive.co.za |
| Published: 09/09/2011 |
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ALL right-thinking people agree that our prisons have to move away from being facilities meant to merely lock up those that have found themselves in conflict with the law. We have to move to a situation where the main priority of correctional facilities is to rehabilitate offenders. The ANC-led government is in total agreement with this view and the White Paper on corrections attests to that. However, the effectiveness of re-education or rehabilitation is a function of the environment in which it takes place. The proposition that rehabilitation stems from the attitude of the offenders themselves have merit. But its shortcoming is that it incorrectly infers that attitude is an immutable trait that cannot be altered or influenced by environmental factors. There is sufficient evidence to prove that the majority of offenders who return to their old ways after serving terms commit worse crimes than before. Many become career criminals. Some observers say that correctional centres have become "universities of crime". Clearly, when a measure meant to achieve a prescribed outcome achieves its opposite, we should ask why is society more vulnerable to a person after he serves time? The answer lies in another question - who controls prison life? Can the state validly claim to be in control after "shutdown" and staff leave at the end of the day? It is common knowledge that correctional officials have limited control over prison life after "shut down" when a shadow system of governance takes over. Those who during the day appear no different in status than others, gradually occupy their positions according to hierarchy within the gang system. Indigenous languages become replaced with Shalambom, which legitimises the ignorance of the law and upholds the law of gang members, which is designed to be an antithesis of government law. Read More. |
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