Correctional Services Minister Ben Skosana on Sunday proposed restorative justice as a better way of punishing offenders than the retributive method currently used.
Announcing the upcoming International Restorative Justice Week at a function in Mamelodi, Pretoria, the minister said the concept was gaining currency in the treatment of offenders world-wide.
”According to restorative justice principles, offenders are held directly accountable to the people they have violated to restore the losses and harm suffered by the victims,” he explained. ”It provides an opportunity for mediation, dialogue, negotiation, and problem solving which could lead to healing, a greater sense of safety and enhanced offender reintegration into the community.”
Skosana told his audience four out of every 1 000 South Africans were in jail. Latest figures put the country’s prison population at 181 908 of whom 53 104 were still unsentenced.
”Our accommodation capacity remains at 111 874 which means we are overcrowded by 71 034 prisoners or 64%.”
Skosana said his department was aware of public dissatisfaction with the criminal justice system which was seen as focusing too much on the offender and too little on the victim or the community.
”This dissatisfaction has necessitated, on our part, a
fundamental rethinking of our criminal justice system and the need to examine approaches like restorative justice which is based on the redefinition of crime as an injury to the victim and the community rather than as an affront to the power of the state,” Skosana added.
”Community service appeals strongly to a sense of natural justice; it involves a clear demand on offenders that they pay the debt to victims and the community by working without pay; it contributes to the quality of life of local communities through the
completion of a wide variety of useful work; it has consistently achieved excellent rates of successful completion and lower rates of conviction; it costs less than prison and probation; and it is even capable of repeated use in selected cases.”
In comparison, Skosana said punitive imprisonment often increased the risk of recidivism. He also highlighted that restorative justice has long been a
core element of indigenous justice.
”The emphasis of African justice systems has not been on punishment but on finding a compromise that would be acceptable to all parties and would be regarded by the community as generally a right decision,” the minister added. – Sapa