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Support prisons to bail us out
By
Our Reporter - 04-10-2002 |
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Comment
A couple of weeks ago we learnt that inmates in our prisons this year harvested enough maize, from their fields, to feed themselves. We commended both the authorities and the inmates for a job well-done.
Given that positive scenario, one would hope for every bit of support to prisons, to enable them to achieve even more. It is in this vein that we find the Malawi Prison Service’s request for more funding from government justifiable.
What is most interesting is the fact that the prison authorities have gone beyond thinking just about themselves and the inmates. They are nursing an ambitious idea of using their labour and land to contribute to the national economy. What a brilliant idea.
All this goes to underscore the wider scope of the prison service, which from the look of things does not want to merely put itself at the receiving end. They too want to contribute to efforts of improving our fast deteriorating economy.
We have no reason to doubt them, because we are aware of a farm club that was formed at Chichiri prison in 1998, which went a long way in improving food shortage problem there. We are also aware of a donation of 500 kilogrammes of fresh vegetables which Mzuzu Central Prison made to Mzuzu Central Hospital in August 2001.
We are sure it is because of such achievements that last month Malawi scooped first position in Africa for implementing prison farms at a Pan-African Conference on Prisons in Ougadougou, Burkina Faso. We also believe this is what DFID aimed at when it offered to fund implementation of prison farms in the year 2000.
Now it is important to remind government of its commitment to take over the project within a couple of years. Our prisons have the labour and the land, besides increasing their budgetary allocation, they need farm inputs to give them encouragement towards sustaining their farming programme. It’s a cause that should be handled with the urgency and seriousness it deserves. |
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