Africa-Press – Cape verde. The Minister of Justice, Joana Rosa, stated this Monday that a prison system that does not integrate security, intelligence, and crisis management is doomed to failure, advocating an integrated and preventative approach to face new challenges.
The minister was speaking at the opening of two training sessions for prison security officers, an initiative taking place within the framework of bilateral cooperation between the Directorate-General of Prison Services and Social Reintegration of Cape Verde and Portugal.
The first session, dedicated to Prison Security and Intelligence, aims, according to the Ministry of Justice, to establish and consolidate a functional model of prison intelligence capable of ensuring the collection, analysis, and production of strategic knowledge oriented towards risk prevention and threat mitigation.
The second session, focused on Crisis Management, Maintenance and Restoration of Order, aims to strengthen the operational response capacity to events likely to compromise institutional stability.
“The training that is now beginning is not an isolated event. It is part of a coherent, sustained, and long-term public policy aimed at equipping our staff with the technical, human, and ethical skills necessary to meet the challenges of the 21st century,” explained Joana Rosa.
In times of accelerated social, economic, and technological transformation, the government official stressed that the world has become more complex, more interconnected, and, in many respects, more insecure.
“Security threats have evolved, becoming more diffuse, more sophisticated, and more difficult to anticipate,” she warned, pointing to organized crime, drug trafficking, and violent extremism as phenomena that know no borders and constantly challenge the capabilities of states.
As she emphasized, prisons no longer house only those who have committed common, minor or medium-level offenses, but also individuals linked to complex criminal networks, with organizational capacity, resources, and the determination to disrupt internal order.
The minister stated that the prison system, as a mirror of society, inevitably reflects these complexities and challenges, and that a prison system without an integrated vision of security, intelligence, and crisis management is doomed to failure.
In this sense, she clarified that the objective of the training is not to transform agents into “spies,” but to empower them to observe, record, analyze, and share information in a structured way, so that they can contribute consciously and systematically to collective security.
“The old image of the prison guard, the one who merely watched, opened and closed doors, is an image of the past, which no longer serves the present and does not prepare for the future. The prison officer of today and tomorrow must simultaneously be a security manager, capable of assessing risks, identifying threats, and implementing preventive measures,” she argued.
For his part, the Portuguese ambassador, João Queirós, emphasized that cooperation between Portugal and Cape Verde goes beyond the proximity of legal systems and good bilateral relations, being based above all on common values, such as human dignity and respect for fundamental rights, including those of people deprived of their liberty.
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