Malawi MisAdventures of Tess and Jim

A few months ago, an old wall clock and a broken telephone handset was stolen from the guard hut at our office during the night. The 4 guards who were on duty that night were questioned, but none of them owned up to taking the goods, nor had any explanation on how it got stolen. 3 of the guards are hired from a guard service company called Securicor, and the 4th guard was a long time loyal employee, who had been working for the organization for over 10 years. Since none of the guards owned up to the petty theft, the police was called to investigate the relatively simple case. During the course of the police investigation, one of the Securicor guards ran off, and to this day is still “at large”. I remember not even thinking twice about the case, as it seemed pretty clear to everyone that the guy who ran off must have been feeling a little guilty, and I thought that the case was closed. However, 5 months after the fact, I was shocked to find out that the police had pursued the case, ignoring the fact that one suspect had run off, and had taken the guards to court. I was even more astounded to find out that our long time loyal guard was somehow charged as “guilty” and sentenced to spend 9 months in jail. The day before he was supposed to enter prison, we heard the news. All our staff members rallied together, and brought up this issue with management. Even management wasn’t aware, as the case was in the hands of the court. In the end, the lawyer for the organization was called, and he was able to have the charges rescinded, and the sentence was suspended, saving our colleague from 9 months of unwarranted jail time.

Malawian jails are overflowing with both hardened criminals and petty thieves. If a person is caught vending goods on the street, and can’t pay the 500 MK (4$) fine, he is sent to jail, the same jail where the guy who chopped off his wife’s arms for cooking the wrong dinner is sent, where a petty thief is sent for stealing a bicycle, or where the man who killed, roasted and ate a 5 year old girl is sent. While I haven’t spent any time in there myself (not yet at least haha) I have been doing a lot of research on Malawian jails as we are trying to secure funding to integrate a HIV/AIDS prevention program within the jail system.

The research itself makes me sick to my stomach. Reports of abuse and rape, lack of basic amenities, and people living in filth, rife with disease. The reality of being incarcerated include one bowl of nsmia (maize porridge) a day, 2 showers a week (if lucky) under the “one” water spigot, fetid open overflowing latrines, and being tightly squeezed into a concrete cell for 14 hours a day. The cells are so tight that at night, everyone sleeps on their side, and can only turn when a whistle is blown periodically so that everyone can turn at the same time. In 2003, researchers found that almost half of the inmates hadn’t even had a trial to determine their guilt or not, while others had no hope of a trial as their case file had been lost. In the main prison in the south of the country, 1 out of every 20 inmates die in jail for different reasons, and 49% of every inmate who goes to the clinic for medical purposes has tested positive for HIV. While the main purpose of our proposed program will be to stem the HIV infection rates as many people get infected in jails then pass it on to their families and community; I know that the most basic health issues will overshadow HIV prevention, not to mention elementary concerns of justice and human rights.