A damning video that showed warders selling prisoners alcohol, drugs, sex slaves and even a loaded gun has been handed over to the Jali Commission of Inquiry, SABC news said on Tuesday.
SABC news said the four prisoners, who are from Grootvlei Prison in Bloemfontein, filmed the video using a hidden camera and gave it to Tatolo Setlai, the head of their prison.
Setlai then handed the tape over to the Jali Commission.
The four prisoners, whose sentences range from murder to armed robbery to theft, got hold of a spy camera in March this year.
The result was two and a half hours of footage showing several warders smuggling drugs and providing older prisoners with sexual services in the form of juvenile offenders.
SABC news said the four prisoners filmed themselves buying dagga and mandrax from the warders and even filmed the warders buying stolen food from one of the prisoners.
The most sensational footage captured a prisoner performing sexual acts with a juvenile offender brought to his cell by one of the warders.
Bloemfontein’s Grootvlei Prison is home to 2 000 medium and maximum security prisoners.
The warders are to be suspended, the Correctional Services Ministry said.
”The Minister (Ben Skosana) has given instruction for the suspension of all the warders implicated in the video so that further investigations may continue without hindrance,” it said in a statement in Pretoria.
Representative, Tsoeu Ntsane, said about 22 warders would be affected.
Skosana also ordered the transfer of the four prisoners who made the video tape to another prison in the Free State for their own safety. -Sapa