NAIROBI, Kenya, Mar 8 — The State Department for Correctional Services is set to launch an ambitious campaign dubbed ‘one prisoner, one bed, one mattress‘ countrywide to address lamentable conditions in prisons.
The department on Wednesday issued an appeal for 60,000 beds and mattresses to support the campaign.
Principal Secretary Mary Muthoni said the campaign will seek to recalibrate the department’s operations to an institution that reforms inmates.
“When somebody is sentenced and is contained in those four walls, you must realize that is the biggest punishment that you can ever give a human being. Our mandate is to correct,” Muthoni said.
She was speaking during the International Women’s Day celebrations at the Langata Women Maximum Security Prison where she hosted First Lady Rachel Ruto.
“We do not want people sleeping on the floor anymore in this country. If you want to change the world, go back and make your bed,” she said.
Muthoni said the department will empower prison-run workshops to make bed but appealed for donations to bridge the gap.
“We are making our beds and as the Correctional Services Department. How will you even ask them (inmates) to stitch when their ribs are paining because of sleeping on the floor?” the PS posed.
Dignified care
She pointed out that the department is keen on providing care and dignified services to inmates to realize the mandate to correct as opposed to punishing them.
Muthoni revealed that so far, the department has received 1,000 mattresses against a target of 60,000 needed across the country.
The PS further called on the Judiciary to fast track cases involving women who are behind bars together with their children.
She expressed concern over a the existence of innocent children in prison.
“Children are very vulnerable to diseases, mannerisms and all that,” she noted.
First Lady Rachel Ruto, who was the guest speaker at the event, launched Carakana project, a program to equip women inmates with various skills including cross stitching.
She pledged countrywide implementation of the project which is a continuation of her 2016 initiative where inmates at the Lang’ata Women Maximum Security Prison have learnt how to cross stitch and make a living out of it.
“Since 2016, Carakana project has trained over 1500 women who have produced quality artifacts that have earned them Sh5.15 million,” she said.
“Cross stitching is a source of hope for the women in prison. It gives them dignity, a livelihood, respect from family and a feeling of achievement,” the First Lady noted.
