Dear Editor,
I BELIEVE it is fair comment to say that, in recent times, Guyana has been affected by crime and the situation is getting worse every day. As I see it, this is because present-day prison sentences are no longer a deterrent to criminals. Instead, jails seem to be universities of crime, where criminals go in and come out as better criminals. Therefore, I think it is time to think about reintroducing old-fashioned jail time with ‘hard labour’ and make going to jail the punitive measure it is supposed to be.

There was a time in Guyana when the courts used to sentence persons convicted of violent crimes to jail with “hard labour” and, sometimes, such convicts would also be sentenced to get a specified amount of “strokes”, meaning lashes with a ‘cat o’nine tails’ whip. If one compares the level of crime in those days to what is happening now, it is easy to see that Guyana was a much more lawful society then than it is today. So we need to stop doing what does not work and go back to what worked.

Guyana got into the current crime situation because it was quietly pressured by powerful international lobbyists to adopt the values of the developed western world and rid its justice system of what liberals call ‘cruel and unusual punishments’. So Guyana stopped sentencing serious criminals to jail with hard labour, stopped giving them strokes and stopped executing them. Gradually, sentencing criminals became more about rehabilitating them than punishing them. And look at what has happened!

It is clear to me that different nations need to do different things to control crime, because each country’s crime situation is unique. There is no “one-size-fits-all” policy; the measures any nation takes to fight crime must be based on its unique crime situation, the resources available to fight crime, plus multiple social, economic, cultural and religious variables that are peculiar to that country and no other. Therefore, Guyana has to look for crime-fighting policies that fit Guyana.

This nation is going through tough times with crime — tough times require tough solutions. What we need to do is re-examine the old punishments for crime that worked for us in the past to see how we can modify them and bring them back in a way that takes into account reasonable concerns about prisoners’ rights. The University of Guyana is churning out Sociology and psychology graduates; get them involved in this process and let’s find ways to reintroduce, at least, hard labour as a punitive measure against crime.

I believe the spate of breakouts from our jails and other problems caused by slackness in dealing with prisoners can be dealt with more effectively by giving hardened criminals sentences with hard labour to teach prisoners the value of hard work. There are too many idle prisoners in our jails getting up to mischief. Are we focusing too much on rehabilitation and not enough on punishment? I believe they should be put to do hard work as punishment and to deter others from committing crimes.

It is expensive to feed the prisoners, clothe them, provide them with medical care, train them and secure them, all for nothing in return.

Don’t get me wrong; I believe in rehabilitation. But counselling, boxing, weight-lifting and sleeping are not enough for effective rehabilitation and certainly do not contribute to their upkeep, which is being completely financed by the state. I was once involved in monthly motivational seminars for prisoners and I would witness the prisoners running away when it was time for boxing classes.

It is important and ultimately beneficial for prisoners to channel their energies positively, while simultaneously contributing to their upkeep.
Guyana has a lot of public works that could benefit from properly organised, easily available prison labour. If you do the research, you will see that prison labour makes an enormous contribution to the economies of nations such as America. Of course, there are penal labour laws that prevent cruel or unusual punishment and ensure safety and health standards. In fact, prisoners are paid for their labour and contribute to their maintenance in jail, child support and restitution to the victims of crime.

I believe that putting prisoners to do hard labour will not only provide a human resource pool for public works that other labourers are unwilling or unable to do. Psychiatric treatment and counselling alone are not enough; hard work and forced discipline would help restore order to persons with dysfunctional or anti-social personalities. Besides this, hard labour can provide inmates with useful work skills if it is properly administered by prison authorities. We can do it in a way that makes criminals have a better chance to be employed on their release from prison.

Many advocates of prison labour point out that hard labour can be incredibly useful for rehabilitation, because it promotes general health and physical fitness, it relieves the boredom of prison routines, it leaves less time for wrongdoing and idle pursuits, and that it helps to instil in criminals’ minds the pride and self-reliance necessary to life outside prison.
I do not in any way mean to suggest that Guyana should simply go back to the system of hard labour that was in place decades ago; that would be foolish. We live in a much more advanced society and we have more data at our fingertips. We need to research hard-labour programmes in the outside world that were successful, in which prisoners were reformed, got useful work skills and were reintegrated successfully into society. Then we can use this data to craft a system that suits our capacity and needs.

Anyone who does research on hard labour in prisons will find a heap of information about how it was done in cruel and inhumane ways in different nations throughout history. I am certain people could even dig up horror stories about hard labour or flogging in Guyana’s history. That is why a lot of people think it is draconian and want to do away with it. My point is: since we know what the issues and challenges were in the past, can’t we use this data to create a better hard- labour system that works for us?

Some argue that hard labour in prisons is not voluntary and therefore it is like slave labour. I do not agree. By being convicted of serious crimes, persons are punished by losing their right to freedom, their right to vote and a whole set of personal rights. What is wrong with them being punished by being compelled to do hard work and by them losing the right to refuse to do it? I strongly believe that persons who do the crime must do the time, as society sees fit.

I do believe Guyana should adopt a sensible approach and make sure prison labour is not used in a way that provides unfair competition to legitimate employers or drives down the pay of certain workers in the economy. These are valid concerns, but it is well within the capacity of this nation’s leaders and people to design and activate a prison ‘hard-labour’ system that punishes serious criminals appropriately, serves as a deterrent to others and has caveats against abuse and other negatives.

Given all the external influences on Guyana at this time, it might be hard to reintroduce flogging in prisons or hang murderers. But it would be much easier to reintroduce prison sentences with hard labour, albeit with appropriate checks and balances in place. At the very least, this is the time to start thinking about it. I expect much critique on the above and that is understandable; but desperate times call for serious but wise thought and actions. I hope to create a respectable debate out of which will come out great ideas to help our prisoners who hurt and kill and repeatedly steal. We need them to learn to respect life and to value others as they value themselves. They need to learn to feed themselves and appreciate the value of hard work. We are engulfed by crime; we have to find effective ways to deter crime, even if we have to resort to “an old time something come back again”.
Regards
Roshan Khan