Programme Director
Acting National Commissioner: Mr. Zach Modise
Chief Operating Officer, Chief Deputy Commissioners,
Regional Commissioners and Deputy Commissioners
Justice, Crime Prevention & Security Cluster Representatives
Our Elderly Female Offenders, who are our Graduates today
Community Leaders
Correctional Services Officials
The Community of Middleburg and surrounding areas
Media
Distinguished Guests
Today’s certification ceremony is part of this year’s Corrections Week. A year in which we celebrate 20 years of our liberation and the demise of apartheid rule. A 20-year journey towards a humane correctional system for a safer South Africa. In essence, we are about taking stock of our achievements over 20 years of freedom, while pledging to do more to realise the ideals outlined in the National Development Plan (NPA) with respect to rehabilitation of offenders.
The National Development Plan (NDP) says: “successful reintegration of released prisoners into society is largely dependent upon the quality of rehabilitation programmes and conditions into which they are released.” We are urged to deliver correctional services in a manner that ensures released offenders do not re-offend and are able to resist any relapse into the life of crime.
The Stats SA says in South Africa, scales favour men in education, literacy, employment and financial standing. Women access to education, skills development, participation in the economy and even in death they rate much lower than their male counterparts. Despite progress made to mainstream gender since 1994, which made South Africa one of the leading countries in the world with regard to women in leadership, so much more still needs to be done to reverse decades and centuries of discrimination and deprivation of women.
The training we have provided for women inmates in beadwork production including arts and craft is very innovative. It is preparing them to play a significant role in the fast rowing “beads industry” in South Africa, which contributes at least R3.4 billion to the Gross domestic product (GDP) and employs 1.2 million people. In many instances it is the sole source of household income, and beadwork is recognised as a potential growth point in the Culture Industry’s Growth Strategy of South Africa that is driven by our partner – the Department of Arts and Culture. Areas of growth identified include interior design, gifts, tourism, exports, etc.
We must prepare these graduates to fully exploit these opportunities through, among others, training them in marketing including using cost effective information and communication technologies such as cellphones, pricing, bargaining and in basic financial management. We also urge our partners in the NGO sector, Faith-based sector and in government to help in widening the horizons of growth and development of these wonderful graduates. Through such partnerships, we will be contributing in reducing barriers to their re-integration into their communities upon their release.
Our certification ceremony today, marks continuing collaboration with our partners such as the Department of Arts and Culture, established universities, the National Youth Skills Development Agency, the sector Education and Training Authorities as well as the Departments of Basic and Higher Education as well as the Department of Labour.
I appreciate the fact that families of the offenders and representatives of their communities are also part of this celebration, because you are part of the societal collective responsible for making rehabilitation work better and improvements in social re-integration. You must be in the frontline in driving changes in the community’s attitude towards ex-offenders and in reducing the stigma that becomes a serious barrier to re-entry.
Correctional Services offers a wide range of interventions that build offender skills, competencies and a sense of self-worth. Sports, recreation, arts, culture and library services are being offered to offenders to assist them to re-order their lives in a positive manner.
Today we are witnessing the translation of the ideals outlined in the Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) on Art Access in Correctional Centres, signed by the National Commissioner and Director-General of the Department of Arts and Culture(DAC). Women are considered as a special category of offenders.
The initial beadwork training programme, kicked-off across the country from 11 to 22 November 2013, and the second phase took place from 17 to 28 March 2014. Sentenced female offenders constitute only 2.5% of 115 590 sentence offenders as of the 22 September 2014. Women should be commended in general for constituting only 2904 of the sentenced offenders while they are over 51% of the national population in South Africa. Men have a lot to learn from women.
Over the years, DCS has realised the importance of art development by offenders. We would like to see more local communities, as well as tertiary and other institutions, becoming more involved in arts and culture initiatives in all our 243 correctional centres. This involvement may include, but is not limited to, donations of raw materials as well as serving as trainers, mentors and so on. Please take some time to appreciate the beadwork, produced and created by our offenders, on exhibition here today.
DCS must become an active agent of this envisaged radical change/transformation of our country. We must increasingly become a key player on the broader socio-economic development of our society, by ensuring that those placed in our care leave our institutions able to join the mainstream in socio-economic development of our nation as an integral part of economic and social inclusion. If we talk of gross inequalities that continue to plague our country even after 20 years of its freedom, the people incarcerated in our facilities largely represent those excluded from the mainstream.
We are changing our historical role of being passive recipients of what society produces and sometimes complain about these pattern which result in overcrowding and high levels of violence. Our rehabilitation programmes, apart from offering critical educational and vocational competencies to inmates, should also offer inspiring, and life changing stories that should assist inmates to value their lives, history, culture and identity.
I am convinced that if we can multiply these efforts and the rehabilitation of offenders, we will make a significant dent on the triple challenges of poverty, inequality and unemployment that we face as the South African society. Indeed, the role of Correctional Services transcends a mere custodial function and a narrowly defined rehabilitation enterprise. Working together, let us improve our people’s socio-economic development needs, through poverty reduction and employment opportunities, and thereby contribute to the fight against crime.
Thank you.
