Minister of Internal Affairs, Maj. Gen. Kahinda Otafiire has proposed that Uganda Prisons Service be removed from the civil service category, arguing that the Prisons Service operates differently from typical civil services, as its duties involve handling security and correctional services.
Otafiire made the revelation during the pass-out of seventy (70) officers who have been undertaking a Prisons Junior Command Course (JCC).
Otafiire’s stance is that treating the Prisons Service like any other civil service entity leads to operational and administrative constraints since they hold guns which are lethal.
“Ideally all officers of the armed forces are part of the reserve forces. But you know our people are very conservative. I one day told some officers to write me a paper removing the armed forces from the civil service but up to now these gentlemen haven’t done so.
How can a prison or police service be part of the civil service yet the police and prison officers carry arms?” Ofiire said.
He argued, “A gun is a lethal weapon and those who carry them should be managed differently from those who do ordinary service jobs.”
Otafire tasked the Commissioner General of Prisons to write a paper and will present it to the cabinet to distinguish those who carry weapons from those with chalk and syringes because Prison officers have the skills which if misused and are lethal.
“You have a skill if mismanaged is lethal. So you have to be handled differently from those who do benign jobs like the chaplains,” he noted.
He further not that although prisons are meant for punishments, the prisons philosophy emphasizes rehabilitation since no one is born a criminal but engagement in crime is due to the environment in which one is raised and circumstances in which one grows up.
He also noted that the Prisons authorities are trying their level best to provide opportunities for people to acquire self-supporting skills.
He congratulated Prisons general Commissioner, Johnson Byabashaija for having the least recidivism rate which has been achieved through the rehabilitation philosophy.
Speaking at the same event, Johnson Byabashaija reported that the Chief of Defence Forces (CDF) is still hesitant to admit Prisons officers, stating, “We don’t go to collect clients and there should be no hesitation on this.”
Byabashaija decried the increase in the prisoners’ population which is too high to be managed by the Prisons staff.
“I have 14097 staff, 13596 of them are uniform and 501 are non-uniformed staff. The 14097 however represent only 33% of the staff establishment. More staff is definitely needed to effectively manage all our prisons that now number at 269 prisons countrywide with a prisoners’ population of 4129,” he said.
He said that the population is composed of 4129 convicted prisoners representing 52.6% of the total population and 36400 are remand prisoners.
“The remand prisoners are the ones responsible for the congestion which we have in prisons and it is at 376%. This prison population growth which is approximately at 8% per year is the cost driver of all our expenses as far as our budget is concerned. We are struggling to deal with this congestion. Our current space is for 21126 prisoners, so we are approaching four times the number. This is a serious issue that the prison authority must give due consideration and give us strategies on how to deal with this population,” Byabashaija said.
He added that a congested prison is a recipe for health issues, contagious diseases and also transmission to the prison’s warders.
He also raised the challenge of staff accommodation, noting that 48.9% staff are decently housed although the prisons authority is putting up low cost houses for the staff.
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