Address by the Minister, Mr. Sibusiso Ndebele, MP Official Opening of Qalakabusha Correctional Centre School, KwaZulu-Natal
Programme Director
Minister of Basic Education: Ms. Angie Motshekga
Acting National Commissioner: Ms. Nontsikelelo Jolingana
KwaZulu-Natal Regional Commissioner: Mr. M. Nxele
Chief Deputy Commissioners, Regional Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners
Members of the Media
Distinguished Guests
This year (2014) represents a historic milestone of twenty years of freedom, and democracy, in our country. It is an occasion to reflect on what has been achieved in our country, over the past twenty years, by South Africans working together.
Correctional Services is a far cry from the prison service inherited from the apartheid regime in 1994. The transformation programme of our democratic government necessitated that prisons shift from institutions of humiliation to institutions of new beginnings. From 1994 to 2014, the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) achieved a 99.97% success rate in secure custody of inmates. From 2004, the inmate population has been reduced by 31,000 resulting in a saving of more than R1.4 billion to the fiscus. The number of full-time correctional centre schools increased from one in 2009 to twelve in 2013.
You will recall that the Bantu Education Act (Act No. 47 of 1953), later renamed the Black Education Act of 1953, was a segregation law which legalised several aspects of the apartheid system. Its major provision was enforcing racially separated educational facilities. The Minister of Native Affairs at the time, Hendrik Verwoerd, stated that: "There is no place for [the Bantu] in the European community above the level of certain forms of labour ...
What is the use of teaching the Bantu child mathematics when it cannot use it in practice?"
As we commemorate Human Rights Month, let us remind South Africans about the sacrifices that accompanied the struggle for the attainment of democracy in our country. Given the manner in which we were able to pull our country back from the brink of disaster, South Africa is an inspiration to peoples elsewhere in the world who are seeking the resolution of serious conflicts. We are proud of this remarkable achievement.
As we celebrate 20 years of freedom and democracy, we commit ourselves to ensuring that young people in South Africa would live a better life than we did during our time, during the era of apartheid colonialism where education was used as an instrument of subjugation.
According to the latest (2012/13) National Offender Population Profile:
- There was an average total of 152,641 inmates in correctional centres across the country.
- Sentenced offenders constituted 68.51% of the inmate population, and 31.52% were un-sentenced inmates.
- The inmate population decreased by 8,638 (5.36%) compared to 2011/12.
- In 2012/13, one out of every 347 South Africans was incarcerated.
- One out of every 506 South Africans was a sentenced offender.
- One out of every 173 males living in South Africa was incarcerated, and one out of every 252 was a sentenced offender.
- One out of every 7,849 females was incarcerated, and one out of every 11,301 was a sentenced offender.
- Gauteng had the highest percentage of offenders, amounting to 25.07%.
- The highest number of offenders were between the ages of 31-40 years, which represents 29.58% of the total number of sentenced offenders.
- The majority of offenders were classified as mediums and consists of 58.70% of the total sentenced offender population, followed by maximum offenders with a percentage of 24.75%.
- The majority of offenders were incarcerated for aggressive crimes. They constituted 55.44% of the total offender population.
- In all regions, the highest population of offenders were serving sentences ranging between 10 and 15 years.
- Offenders sentenced to life imprisonment were 11,894.
During March 2013, nearly a quarter (24.99%) of the sentenced offender population were youth. A number of inmates who, while not under 25, are still in the prime of their life. Children, as young as 17 years of age, have committed serious crimes. The average inmate is a young substance abuser who, has dropped out of school before high school, is functionally illiterate and, more often than not, homeless.
At least 95% of those incarcerated will return to society after serving their sentence When parents, the extended family, the Sunday school teacher, the school educator, the university professor and everyone else has failed, DCS steps in to remould the character, and improve the skills, of offenders so that they return to society with enhanced prospects of success. We are turning our correctional centres into centres of learning. We are making sure that offenders read, study and work. We are impacting the hearts, heads and hands of offenders so that, upon release, they are in possession of, at least, a certificate in one hand and a skill in the other.
To this end, DCS increased the number of full-time correctional centre schools from one in 2009 to twelve in 2013. This year, three additional schools are scheduled for accreditation including Rustenburg, Boksburg and Ekuseni Youth Centres.
Last year, we announced that, as from 1st April 2013, it is compulsory for every inmate, without a qualification equivalent to Grade 9, to complete Adult Education and Training (ABET) level 1 to 4. Between April and September 2013, 11,649 inmates registered for AET programmes. From 2010 to 2013, 73,881 inmates participated in education programmes.
From 2012 to 2013, 559 inmates wrote Grade 9 to 11 examinations with an average pass rate of 73% in 2013. The number of inmates who wrote Grade 12 examinations doubled, and those who gained university admission also increased. In the 2013 Grade 12 examinations, inmates achieved 60 subject distinctions. Offender Trynos Mohlanga achieved 100% in Business Studies and Offender Celumusa Mhlongo achieved 90% in History. Umlatati Learning Centre, at Barberton Youth Centre in Mpumalanga, achieved a 100% pass rate despite the fact that Grade 12 offenders were only enrolled at this centre during the beginning of 2013.
During 2012/13, 1,049 offenders studied towards post-matric/higher education and training qualifications, 3,525 towards further education and training (FET) college programmes (including electrical engineering, civil engineering, mechanical engineering and marketing) and 4,188 towards skills development programmes (including basic business skills training and entrepreneurship).
During 2012, R66,424 million was spent on training 5,837 offenders including scarce skills such as welding, plumbing, bricklaying, plastering, electrical, carpentry and agricultural skills programmes. A further 416 youth offenders graduated with their International Computer Driver Licence (ICDL) certificates.
Today, in partnership with the Department of Basic Education, as we officially open the Qalakabusha Correctional Centre School, we are proud to announce that this school comprises of 10 classrooms, nine offices, one library, one computer training centre, one staff room and three store rooms. Twenty full-time Educators are employed at this school. For the 2014 academic year, 466 inmates are registered at this school. This includes 357 offenders participating in Adult Education and Training, 20 in Further Education and Training (Mainstream) and 89 in Further Education and Training (College). With regards to the library, the KwaZulu-Natal Department of Education has made available a full-time qualified librarian.
The Qalakabusha Library received a donation of 3,820 books from Van Schaik Publishers and Booksellers, Pearson Publishers and Booksellers, Oxford Publishers and Booksellers, Vivlia Publishers and Booksellers and well as the Department of Basic Education. Offenders from the DCS Production Workshop in Pietermaritzburg are currently manufacturing school desks, and other furniture items, for the school.
As per the National Framework on Offender Labour, DCS is increasing the number of offenders who participate in offender labour, and skills development, programmes.
On 12th February 2013, we signed a MoA with the Department of Basic Education (DBE) to use offender labour to build schools and supply furniture. The obligations of DCS include:
- Manufacture and delivery of school furniture
- Rehabilitation of school furniture
- Construction of school infrastructure
- Maintenance, and refurbishment, of schools, and
- Establishment of school gardens.
Last year, we handed over hundreds of refurbished desks, as well as computers donated by business, to numerous schools. Offenders across the country are giving back to communities, and demonstrating remorse for crimes committed. Offenders, and officials, have built, and renovated, several houses, and schools, in disadvantaged communities including tiling, re-roofing, installing built-in cupboards, painting and plastering, cutting the grass and trees, clearing bushes and cleaning yards.
Within two months of launching the Reading for Redemption campaign on 17th September 2012, books worth millions of rands were donated to correctional centres. Reading and Writing Clubs are being established in correctional centres. On 27th May 2013, we launched Volume One of a poetry series by offenders entitled "Unchained". On 7th March 2013, a copy of the novel, "KWAKUNGEKE KUBE NJE", was handed to its author, Celimpilo Cele, who is an inmate here at Qalakabusha Correctional facility. The novel won the KwaZulu-Natal Provincial Literature Writing Competition, and was published by Oxford University Press.
Tshifhiwa Given Mukwevho from Makhado, who was imprisoned for 11 years and is on parole, pursued a creative writing course with UNISA and, on his release, published his short story collection. Today, Mukwevho is a poet, and community journalist, who topped the inaugural Polokwane Literary Festival. He is negotiating a deal for his first novel.
On 27th May 2013, we launched the Western Cape Arts and Craft Gallery at the Goodwood Correctional Centre for offenders to express their creativity. The Gallery of Hope is enabling offenders to sell their art to the public, support their families and have money when released.
Furthermore, this gallery will be used as an after-care centre for released offenders to make reintegration into society much easier and better.
DCS is aiming towards self-sufficiency through full utilisation of its 40,000 hectares of correctional centre farm land, reaching our target at about 18% less costs than the open market. Over the past two years (2011 to 2013), almost 30 million kilograms of vegetables, fruit and meat were produced by inmates at correctional centre farms and abattoirs. During the same period, 5,578,133 loaves of bread were produced at our six bakeries.
At the Boksburg Correctional Centre Bakery, 22 offenders produce 2,000 loaves of bread daily which feeds 5,000 offenders. The abattoir at Leeuwkop Correctional Facility has been declared the best in Gauteng, for the past five successive years in the category of Low Red Meat Abattoir, winning the gold award. The abattoir at Middledrift Correctional Facility was declared the best in the Eastern Cape, for the past three successive years, in the same category.
Vegetable production takes place on 21 correctional centre farms, and 96 smaller centres; fruit production on 13 farms; milk production on 17 farms; red meat on 18 beef and five small stock farming units; chicken on four farms; layers on seven farms; red meat abattoirs on 17 farms; white meat abattoirs on three farms; and 15 farms focus on piggery. DCS has adopted various orphanages, old age homes and schools, and continues to donate surplus products to disadvantaged communities.
DCS also has production workshops, which operate as business units, including 10 wood workshops, 10 steel workshops, 19 textile workshops, a shoe factory and three sanitary towel units.
Since the launch of the Victim-Offender Dialogue (VOD) programme on 28th November 2012, more than 96 VOD sessions were hosted with 1,342 DCS officials trained on the VOD implementation guidelines and 109,086 sentenced offenders, and 1,750 victims, benefitting from the programme. VODs are based on a theory of justice that considers crime, and wrongdoing, to be an offence against an individual or community, rather than the state.
Restorative justice, that fosters dialogue between victim and offender, shows the highest rates of victim satisfaction and offender accountability. During this term of government, victim participation in Correctional Supervision and Parole Board (CSPB) hearings, on offender parole applications, increased substantially. In 2009, 208 victims participated in CSPB sessions. In 2013, 1,215 victims made their voices heard in parole hearings.
As DCS, we will continue to deliver justice for victims and ensure that offenders make restitution both to society for their crimes and leave correctional centres with better skills, and prospects, which will result in a second chance towards becoming ideal citizens. However, we want to challenge our citizens to reflect on their role in promoting rehabilitation. There is no single government institution that will win the battle against crime without society playing its part. Corrections remains a societal responsibility.
