A Kokstad prison has been ready for occupation for several months, but cannot be used because of a lack of services
Paul Kirk
While prisons throughout the country are overflowing with inmates, the Department of Correctional Services has available but unusable accommodation for thousands of prisoners.
There is nothing wrong with the way the super maximum security prison in Kokstad has been built. Like all C Max prisons it has pink walls an idea first pioneered by disgraced former prisons boss Khulekani Sithole, who believed the colour would calm prisoners.
The problem is where the prison is situated near a quaint Eastern Cape village, with an equally quaint sewerage treatment plant.
Francois Rogers, a representative for the Kokstad town council, says the council repeatedly warned the Departments of Public Works and Correctional Services that the prison could be problematic if it were sited near Kokstad. But “they went ahead and built it anyway”.
Two prisons are being built in Kokstad a medium-security institution and the new C Max.
Kokstad which has no major industry has to supply electricity and water services to the prisons and the homes built for warders. Water and electricity are already in great demand as 3 000 low-cost houses have been built near the town.
Rogers says Kokstad can probably supply water and electricity, “but sewerage would be out of the question”. The town’s sewerage treatment facilities cannot cope with the prison and the expected increase in population.
“The sewerage plant is already operating at 100% of capacity. If you put anyone in that prison, you are going to have huge problems,” says Rogers.
He says electricity and water supplies will almost certainly be exhausted if the town were to grow significantly or experience a drought. The prisons are expected to attract industry to the area, which will rapidly deplete the electricity supply.
Rogers says his council has already borrowed millions of rands to upgrade Kokstad’s infrastructure. But if the prisons become operational the council will have to spend many more millions on upgrading sewerage and electricity supplies. The council simply does not have the money to do so.
Says Rogers: “People must not get us wrong. The people of Kokstad want this development. The prisons will bring new jobs to the area and revitalise it.”
Rogers says that, among other proposals, the council had asked the departments of public works and correctional services to service a loan needed to upgrade the town until such time as the council could take over payments.
The prisons will bring a massive cash injection into the area. Warders’ salaries will total about R70-million a year and many supplies for the prisons will be sourced from the town. This, however, will lead to an increased burden on the town’s infrastructure.
Technically the C Max prison in Kokstad has been ready for occupation for several months. Regardless of the sewerage supply problems, C Max could accept inmates, but there is a problem with the provision of laundry and catering services.
Until such time as the medium-security prison is completed, C Max will not be able to operate. In order to ensure absolute maximum security in C Max, prisoners cannot cook or do laundry. These jobs could give them access to the means of escaping spoons can be made into knives and bedsheets into ropes, for in-stance. Kokstad’s medium-security prison will provide laundry and food services.
The construction of the medium-security prison is about 80% complete. Director General of the Department of Public Works Tami Sokutu claims the delays are partly the fault of the construction company, Mandlethu-Anderson.
However, the department also says the ground where the construction is taking place is unexpectedly hard, the weather has been unusually inclement and other factors conspired against the construction.
A Mandlethu-Anderson representative says the delays were “completely unavoidable” and largely caused by the department, which changed consultants twice. Adding to the construction firm’s woes, a company contracted to supply electrical services has gone bankrupt.
The cost of the Kokstad prison projects comes to about R480-million. Since January, Mandlethu-Anderson has been paying R1-million a month in penalties for the late delivery of the prison complex.
A representative for the Department of Public Works, Adelaide Ruiters, says her department is closely monitoring the construction of the medium-security prison to ensure completion by the end of this month. She says the operation of the C Max prison without the medium security prison will be “problematic”.
Ruiters says the public works department is not responsible for upgrading municipal services. “The department would like to note that only once construction of the prison was at an advanced stage the municipality indicated possible strain on their ability to provide bulk infrastructure to both the prison and other developments in Kokstad.”
The departments of public works, correctional services and local government and provincial affairs had made “interventions” to organise a bank loan for the Kokstad municipality, says Ruiters.