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Design of Prisons not Gender Sensitive
The Herald
February 17, 2004

By Ropafadzo Mapimhidze

THE announcement by the Minister of Justice Legal and Parliamentary Affairs Cde Patrick Chinamasa about introducing an open prison for female inmates at a farm in Mashonaland East is long overdue.

This will be the second open prison system following the one that was initiated in September 2000 at Connemara Prison in Kwekwe specifically for males where the late former president Cannan Sodindo Banana served his jail term.

This development is taking place following calls for the judiciary to consider sentencing people facing minor offences to do community service in order to reduce congestion in all prisons.

Prison population continues to grow against strained facilities at the institutions with the present holding capacity having exceeded by over 4 000 inmates.

Introduction of an open prison system for women would be a relief to these inmates who constitute about 3,5 percent of the prison population in Zimbabwe, most who are in for crimes that largely did not require custodial sentences.

A Tragedy of Lives, Women in Prison in Zimbabwe, a book that was published recently with financial assistance from the Canadian High Commission in Harare, expressed concern about the manner in which prisons were constructed without women in mind.

Facilities and rehabilitation programmes at these prisons were all based on male needs making the prison a place not designed for the woman.

Ms Julie Stewart one of the researchers explained that female prisoners were likely to be overlooked.

"If women are to be in prison with their children, the children's development needs are to be adequately addressed.

"Each woman needs to have a private space to be with her child and to have the opportunity to play and interact with her child in a relaxed and calm atmosphere," said Ms Stewart.

A former magistrate Ms Ollyn Nzuma agreed with Ms Stewart's assertion and said that there should be facilities for babies like changing rooms for babies and mothers to sleep.

"Inmates have various diseases and should we bring up children in such an environment," Ms Nzuma asked.

Given the nature of their crimes, the majority of women were not likely to be a security threat to society, thus the open prison service would seem to be a practical and humanitarian way forward.

Ms Mabel Chinyamurindi a former chief superintendent in the Zimbabwe Prison Service explained in the research that most women were in prison for minor offences and an open prison system would offer them the opportunity for home visits and to check on their families.

She said that most women had committed crimes in order to look after their families especially those who were serving sentences for drug offences.

Just like the shoplifters they peddled Mbanje so they would be able to fend for their families.

"A small fraction of the prisoners would have committed murder and usually commit murder in anger," she said.

She admitted that keeping babies and small children in prison with their mothers was unsatisfactory and stressful for women and potentially prejudicial for children.

Ms Chinyamurindi cited one case of a child that was born at Mlondolozi prison that never put its feet on the ground. The first time an officer took the child outside, the child was so scared and cried so much.

"You can get really affected and you ask why on earth we are putting this child through this," Ms Chinyamurindi is quoted in the book.

The former prison officer recommended that pregnant prisoners be released so they could deliver their babies in a healthier environment where they would adequately prepare for its arrival.

She also observed that very few women got emotional support from their spouses during the period of incarceration.

Speaking at the launching of the book produced by the Zimbabwe Women Writers Association (ZWNN), High Court Judge Justice Rita Makarau reminded the prison services that prisoners should not lose their status as human beings by punishing them inhumanely.

"If the rationale of letting babies of women offenders in is to keep them with their mothers, then they should not be treated as convicts by giving them the same diet as what is given to their mothers and also being locked up from 4.30pm," she said.

Lock up times normally run from 4.30pm to about 7.30 am.

Women with babies in prison seem to carry a double punishment of coping themselves and fending for their children.

Just like all women in general, women in prison are confined in a male organised and dominated space, were they are the strangers and the marginalised within the prison system.

When they are moved into these male spaces into which they do not fit, very little is done to accommodate their needs.

Managing menstruation and nightly experiences of urinating indicate that the arrangements for women's sanitation are makeshift and lacked any real appreciation.

Men can urinate in containers with a great deal of more direction and accuracy than women, and can avoid the risk of physical contact with the container.

Knowledge of physiology if applied to what is provided for women indicate to any caring and gender sensitive individuals that what is provided is not just unsatisfactory, but also unhygienic and health risk.

The whole prison system is not sensitive to women's requirements.

The accounts by women interviewed in the book about urinating into cooking oil tins in the dark crowded cells or trying to deal with a soiled sanitary pad leaking menstrual blood is cruel and inhumane treatment.

It is also a health risk to the women.

Under the best conditions, menstruation involves constant awareness and careful management to avoid embarrassment.

Children could well be crawling in the dark around those makeshift toilets.

In 2002 a Harare businessman Mr Stephen Margolis of Margolis Holdings donated cotton wool and sanitary pads following a Press report that highlighted the plight of women at Chikurubi Maximum Prison.

Until recently, women problems were not articulated and, therefore not addressed but there has been an increased awareness on the special situation of women in prison resulting in some improvements.

The research by ZWWA provided a powerful lobbying tool for change not only of prisons, but also of women's overall conditions, for reform of approaches to punishment and for more gender sensitive construction of criminal defences.

It is also a vehicle that gives an opportunity for everyone to respond and seek removal of inhumanities and lobby for formulation of alternative forms of sentencing.

Last year, a chief magistrate gave directives to all magistrates that pregnant and nursing mothers be remanded out of custody.

The magistrates according to the research indicated that women, who committed crimes like for example infanticide, were normally sentenced to community service because they had lots of other responsibilities.

"There is discrimination between different aspects of society. In a petty case you might order a fine of say $1 000, but if the accused fails to pay she is sent to prison for 20 days.

"Those who can pay will escape the jail term. It is a problem because we say the law applies equally to all people, but the anomalies exist. A poor person ends up serving 20 days with labour, a rich person does not," said Ms Nzuma.

Peter Mandiyanike, director of Prison Fellowship urged the judiciary to come up with a new set of laws emphasising that Roman-Dutch laws did not apply to Africans.

"For example, minor crimes in our culture went before the chief. It was the family or kraal head who dealt with them and compensation was the major issue.

"For instance, if I steal your chickens, it was not a big deal as this was dealt at family level, the kraal head would say, 'look you've been caught with Taurai's chicken which could have laid eggs and hatch chickens for her. Return the chicken to her plus another chicken as compensation.'

"What I am saying is that in Zimbabwean culture we are not interested in throwing people into prison. What they are interested in is compensation," said Mr Mandiyanike .

An analysis of Zimbabwe's prison statistics about 10 years ago revealed that about 60 percent of serving prisoners were persons with six months imprisonment term or less.

The analysis also showed that 80 percent were persons serving 12 months imprisonment or less.

According to the 2002 statistics, there were 800 women prisoners at Shurugwi and Chikurubi prisons.

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