Prison conditions deplorable

A just-published report by the Prison Reform Committee said prison conditions were deteriorating in Malawi. The major problem the report identified was overcrowding. It said the population in Malawi’s 23 prisons had doubled in the past three years, from 4,500 inmates in 1997 to 8,000. The report, issued quarterly, blamed the slow judicial process. The committee, chaired by a Supreme Court of Appeal judge and comprises members of the clergy and civil rights NGOs, noted that the overcrowding and lack of proper sanitation facilities in prisons has led to a dramatic rise in the spread of infectious diseases such as scabies and tuberculosis. The committee therefore recommended that the judiciary should consider sentencing convicts with petty crimes to community service work, while juveniles should be sent to reformation centres other than prisons.