CS to focus on inmates’ wellbeing

THE Correctional Service for next year will have work within its allocated 2021 budget allocation of K134 million, a drop of K35 million from this year’s provision.
Correctional Service provides the mechanisms, facilities and services for carrying out the orders of the judiciary in relation to community members who have been charged with or convicted for breaking the laws of the country
And its main mission is to enhance the safety and security of society through secure, humane containment and facilitating the rehabilitation of convicted detainees in partnership with stakeholders in fulfilment of CS mandate and to achieve PNG Vision 2050.
It is responsible to provide counselling, education, and training, which will assist detainees to return to society as reformed citizens.
Commissioner Stephen Pokanis said his administration would concentrate on looking after prisoners – providing food and healthcare for them.
Basically, their security – that’s all we can do due to the massive cut in the budget.
He admitted that times were tough and they would have to make through with the operational budget and focus on getting food for prisoners which was very important so that the prisoners would not be affected.
Recruitment is on hold along with maintenance on PNGCS officers’ houses and prisons and prisoners’ rehabilitation programmes.
The biggest challenge CS currently faces is the continuous jailbreaks because of overcrowding of prisons.
These are the telltale signs of the age-long disorder plaguing the PNG prisons system to which the authorities have turned a blind eye.
And the budget cut for 2021 does not help.
Jailbreak is inevitable when people, who had a brush with the law are kept in prison awaiting trial in perpetuity.
People are stressed. You lock up somebody who is presumed innocent for years and nobody is talking about trial and nobody is giving them information, it’s natural for people to become violent in such a situation.
Successive jailbreaks is a product of the deep rot in the PNG prison system begging to be urgently addressed.
Problems range from mostly under-funding, overcrowded cells, maybe shortage of prison vans to convey inmates to court for trial, poorly paid and unmotivated prison officials, to mention but a few.
It is true that our prisons have, over the years, been a source of concern due to overcrowding, understaffing, lack of adequate medical care, inadequate provisions for female and juvenile detainees, poor administration, long detention of those awaiting trial and limited access to legal advice and representation.
These have frequently led to poor health conditions including frequent jailbreaks.
It seems the prisons have become disciplinary centres rather than being reform schools, where persons who come in conflict with the law are sent for reformation and eventually move back into the society as better persons.
It is a failure of the entire justice system not to respect people who come in conflict with the law, not to recognise that they are presumed innocent and to treat their cases expeditiously.
It is not unnatural for a prisoner who feels hopeless and dehumanised to resort to jailbreak, especially because the system that is supposed to rehabilitate them has rather broken their spirit.
The successive jailbreaks recorded in recent times should be a wake-up call for the Government to address with the nation’s prisons.