Africa-Press – Botswana. Botswana Prison Service (BPS) is in the process of having their training course accredited by Botswana Qualification Authority.
The training course will be raised from the current six months training to a diploma in prisons and correctional management, deputy commissioner of BPS Sekano Sekano said in an interview post awarding of medals by President Advocate Duma Boko at the Prison Staff College, Mahalapye Saturday.
Deputy commissioner charged with custodial services, Mr Sekano who is a chairperson of the committee charged with accreditation of the institution’s courses, said the accreditation process was progressing well while the BPS was on the verge of completing the initial enlistment.
“This means that once one joins the Prison Service, whether with qualifications or not, they will have to go through the diploma in prisons and correctional management course first,” said deputy commissioner Sekano.
Mr Sekano, who has served as an instructor at the staff college from 2001 until he became the head of the facility in 2008, said although he was now promoted to a higher rank, he doubled the duties with those of ensuring that the facility he once headed provided courses that were relevant in the route to transforming from prisons services to correctional services.
In the transformation to correctional services, Mr Sekano, who acknowledged the role of communities in community correction and offenders’ re-integration, appealed for further strengthening of the existing cord that binds the relationships.
“This is a monumental occasion for us because, in addition to the members of the communities we have traditional and political leaders here are going to appreciate what is happening around here. We hope that will afford them time to fully embrace issues regarding prison services,” said Mr Sekano.
The deputy commissioner spoke highly of the prisoners reintegration programme and committees led by dikgosi in various villages saying the move bore fruitful results.
“I can safely say that these committees are healthy although I can’t back that claim with figures. However, of the about 1 500 ex-convicts who left our prisons since the introduction of the programme, only 30 have re-offended,” he said.
Dubbing it a success, the deputy commissioner said the figure of re-offenders vis-à-vis that of the released pointed to the direction the BPS was taking. Before the programme, Mr Sekano said the BPS witnessed a lot of re-offending chiefly because the society shunned ex-convicts.
“When we followed them up, we found out that the ex-convicts felt unfairly judged and unwanted by the communities in which they were released into. Consequently, they would re-offend so that they reunite with fellow convicts,” he said.
The programme is said to have delivered invaluable results and more is expected especially now that the BPS was shifting focus toward correction. Although not outrightly attributing the huge turnout to the success of the reintegration programme, the deputy commissioner thanked Batswana who came in droves to not only celebrate, but to win with them.
In addition to the medal awards, the BPS held a prisoners’ expo where various prisons competed on various courses offered at their facilities and winners were crowned and awarded trophies by President Advocate Duma Boko.
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