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| Africa Subsaharan |
| Zim's prisons: Death no matter what |
| 2009-04-01 |
| Zimbabwe's prisons have long been notorious for being dirty, disease-ridden places of despair, where opponents of President Robert Mugabe languish for months, usually on murky charges of plotting against him. But just how bad conditions have become within prison walls, while the economy collapses without, is only beginning to come to light. A documentary to be screened on SABC television on Tuesday evening shows emaciated prisoners teetering at death's door for lack of food and medication. The documentary, which is based on secret footage obtained by officials and prisoners, also tells of how relatives coming to collect their loved ones' remains are forced to rummage through mounds of dead bodies. The Zimbabwean Association for Crime Prevention and Rehabilitation of the Offender (Zacro) estimates that at least 20 prisoners die each day in the country's 55 prisons. According to Edison Chiota, Zacro national director, most die of HIV/Aids or associated diseases such as tuberculosis, which thrive in unhygienic conditions. The incidence of pellagra, a skin disease caused by malnutrition that can cause serious psychological problems and even death, has also soared. Cholera, on the other hand, a diarrhoeal disease that has killed more than 4 000 Zimbabweans since last autumn, had been been brought under control in prisons "to a certain extent", he said. In the SABC documentary, entitled Hell Hole, 28-year-old Brighton Mudadi's life is shown to to be hanging by a thread. Mudadi, who is serving an 18-month sentence for robbery in the southern Beitbridge prison, has tuberculosis and is severely malnourished. His rib cage protrudes through his matchstick frame as a fellow prisoner helps him wash himself and the soiled pants he is wearing. Accounts from three prisons revealed most prisoners receive only one fist-sized portion of maize porridge a day, with no meat and little to no vegetables. Many rely on family for food supplements. But in a country where more than half the population -- about seven million -- can no longer feed itself, some families have nothing to spare. "The truth is there is not any food in the prisons at the moment and there is no medication to cope with the diseases," said Zacro's Chiota. Ex-prisoners talk of excrement seeping out of blocked toilets and of uncollected bodies piling up in back rooms because families can no longer afford to bury their dead. Zimbabwe's Justice Minister Patrick Chinamasa admitted in Parliament that the hardship afflicting the country was "hitting hardest inside prisons" and appealed for assistance. While many prisoners have complained of overcrowding, Zacro backed up Chinamasa's contention that the prison population had fallen to about 14 000, below the capacity of 17 000, following an amnesty last year. |
| Posted by:Fred |
| #2 bet they wish they hadn't run all those white farmers off now, sure does seem too have wnt too shit since most of them left |
| Posted by: Mt Dew addiction 2009-04-01 17:56 |
| #1 Can we expect the same kind of conditions in our hospitals after we get socialized health care from the One and his minnions?? Just askin', ya' know. |
| Posted by: WolfDog 2009-04-01 11:59 |