THE OTHER UGANDAN PRISONER; TALES AND BURDENS OF UGANDA’S FEMALE INMATES.

Diogo Eric

Uganda’s prison system largely recognises sex as either male or female by classifying individuals by what was biologically inscribed unto them at birth. In their 2015 publication titled ,”Who are Women prisoners? Survey results from Uganda”, the Foundation for Human Rights Initiative and Penal Reform International note that women and girls comprise the minority of prisoners around the world in a ratio of 2:9. With this, the prison Systems allover the world have been designed for men, women thereby find themsleves in a system that does not address their specific needs.

This lack of attention towards women’s gender specifc needs is discriminatory and in Uganda violates Article 21 of the Uganda Constitution which prohibits any form of discrimination based on gender. Needless to mention that there are various national, regional and international legal instruments that bind Uganda in the same spirit.

In the publication cited earlier,it was reported that by August 2014,there were 42,193 people in prisons in uganda and 6% of these were women. Arguably if one is to take into consideration population increments, these figures might have increased but the ratio remains close.

There were also 226 children living with their mothers in prison. For some women, it was reported that their children were living on the streets while for others, they didnot know their whereabouts since the children nolonger wished to associate with them. For Others, and these were really few,their children had been taken up by family members. During a recent visit to Luzira Women’s prison I saw a young girl and was told she was born and has since grown from inside the Prison walls who seemed scared of me. I was told by a female staff member who was escorting me that the little girl hides whenever she sees a man, sometimes she runs away. I remember feeling pity for this child for many reasons but mostly for her physiological grounding.

Interestingly, in 2014, the Uganda Prisons System had an approved capacity of about 16,094 prisoners but was accommodating 42,193 prisoners of whom 30,314 were male and 1879 were female. With 238 prisons in Uganda, 110 hold female prisoners either exclusively or in separate parts of men’s prisons while only 13 are exclusively women’s prisons.

According to the 2013 Human Rights Report on Uganda by the US Department of state, prison conditions in Uganda were poor then and in some cases,life threatening. Prisons outside Kampala lacked food,water,medical care,bedding and means of transporting inmates to court,while also suffering from inadequate and poorly designed physical infrastructure and poor sanitation conditions. Suffice to note, I have visited prisons out of Kampala and one would think this 2013 report was made today.

In this day and age,some prisons still have the bucket method where short and long calls are made in buckets by all and in the morning an inmate takes the refuse for disposal. The few that seem to be moving away from these occasionally lack water in the water toilets that were constructed.

Severe overcrowding across all regions of the country was specifically noted as a problem affecting the female wings of prisons.

Notably, Uganda’s Prisons’ Act specifies that there should be separation of male and female prisoners except for the purposes of work or training under strict supervision. However,the US State Department has reported,as earlier mentioned that ,although there were separate facilities for female prisoners in central prisons,such were lacking in some arears out of the central region. The report also stated that the number of infants housed with their mothers in prisons has increased and yet authorities do not have a budget for this. This leaves many children in prisons lacking basic needs and their mothers worrying over their children’s survival.

The fate and quality of life for the children living with their incarcerated mothers largely rests with volunteers who occasionally visit Prisons and donate to them. Family of Africa is an Italian non-governmental organisation which accommodates children detained with their mothers through providing a number of services such as food,clothing,medical care and accommodation. Additionally, Legal Aid Service Providers have tried extending legal aid through their Legal Aid Service Providers Network (LAPSNET) to women in prisons but this has been limited due to mobility challenges,resource allocations among others. While recognising that legal aid goes along way in softening the burdens of women in prisons,it is important to appreciate that there is need for stakeholders to allocate more resources towards this cause.

Mazungumzo together with a group of Law students at Makerere Law school and three other organizations- Frauen Initiative, Love to give foundation and Case Hospital recently organized a breast cancer screening outreach to Luzira women’s Prisons where most of the inmates were screened and educated on issues to do with breast cancer.

These are only but a few of some of the volunteers working in this space. However, many prisons lack such support from NGOs as there is only little that NGOs can do within their budgets

Many women in Ugandan Prisons are still at the stage of mensruation and have needs specific to this such as sanitary pads,clean water and soap in Uganda. However access to these is problematic. NGOs ,churches,friends and family are the only supply sources of these and the government plays no active role in providing for these. This calls for improvising on the part of women and exposes women to degrading Conditions as most have to tear parts of their uniforms,blankets or newspapers to aid them during their periods.

It is also true that the HIV/STI/TB prevalence rate is slightly higher in prisons than in the general public. Depression has been also cited as a natural consequence of imprisonment and many women have confessed to have entertained suicidal thoughts or having self harmed during their stay in prison. It goes without saying that the medical structures in prisons are inadequate in handling the health needs of the women prisoners , in fact some times these have to wait till they are sent to Luzira which has better medical services for treatment.

A strategy involving private actors can and should be explored in a bid to save lives. At Mazungumzo we think private actors should lend government a supplementary hand in order to help inmates wherever they are access quality medical care. However this should be explored when it comes to all social services.

Central to any criminal justice system is the aspect of mindset change inorder to encourage reformation. To this end,formal and vocational training is key in empowering women in prisons with the necessary skills needed so as to finally lead law abiding productive lives outside prison. Whereas In Uganda, the government provides formal and vocational education at only Luzira upper, Luzira women, Murchison Bay, Kigo,Gulu,Mbale,Mbarara and Arua Prisons, the same is visibly absent in other prisons. There is an urgency of civil and private actors to come in and bridge this gap.

A good example has been by “Product of Prisons” , a non government organisation which provides vocational training to women prisoners who are also paid for their work so as to earn a living beneficial to their families and facilitate their reintergration into the communities at the time of their release.

Conclusively,there has to be concerted efforts in addressing the challenges faced by Ugandan Female prisoners while in prisons and at the time they are out. To this end,the following would be strategic interventions that can be deployed towards addressing the challenges identified here.

1. Provision of formal and vocational education.
2. Access to legal aid.
3. Provision of quality medical treatment especially regarding HIV/AIDs/STDs/TB
4. Counselling and therapy
5. Facilitating and encouraging family and friends to visit inmates more.
6. Introducing Financial support packages for those living prisons so as to provide for their housing and basic settlements concerns.
7. Reunification with children and family.
8. Employment of skilled former prisoners.
9. Protection from community violence.
10. Public and private partnerships to build capacity and allow resource mobilization.

With these, Uganda would successfully exorcise what appears to be one of the last curses of it’s criminal justice system and create a system where even in prison one continues to be treated in a humane manner and is entitled to enjoy the basic human rights entitled to him or her and women do not go through the rude experience of being a Ugandan Female Prisoner in a Ugandan Prison system which was never made to cater for women.

I wish to end with a reflection of a story that is commonly told in Uganda,one that is unfortunately true. One day a public official presented a budget proposal to restock beddings at Luzira maximum prison with the ones fitting of decency and one of the other officials present trashed the proposal saying the proposer should go to a hotel if he wished to see the life he was talking about. To him, good beddings were not meant for prisoners. As one might claim, poetic justice later had it’s way and the same official who was in opposition of the idea was arrested and detained at Luzira Maximum Prison,the fellow interestingly decried the state of beddings in the Prison. This story provokes a call to action for me that I only hope the readers of this article shall experience in equal measure.