ON Sunday, I returned home to a message from a colleague asking, ‘what really going on in Guyana?’ I, of course, had no idea.

I had spent the day without Internet access and did not yet have the opportunity to catch up on the day’s events. Before I could respond to that message, I received another inquiry from a friend asking about what she was seeing in the news.
At this point, I knew that something had gone horribly wrong back home. What never crossed my mind however, was that the problem would have been the prison. After all, only last year we were promised sweeping reforms and promises to ease the congestion considerably in prison were made. Surely, lightning could not strike the same place twice.

I was wrong. Last year, inmates at the Camp Street prison had rioted over poor treatment and living conditions in the prison. The unrest lasted for three days and resulted in 17 inmates dying from the fires set. This time around, as far as news reports go, there has been only one death. That was the death of Prison Warder Odinga Wickham, who was rushed to the Georgetown Public Hospital with gunshot injuries.

The idea that the prison should be moved outside of the environs of Georgetown is one that has been touted for years. This however, has never materialised. After the riot last year, when the conversation once led again to relocating the prison, Minister of Public Security Khemraj Ramjattan stated that we would not be able to get a new prison until the country found itself in a financially better position. He had said that $6M would be needed to ensure a state-of-the art facility, “so that the prisoners won’t be able to burrow themselves like the Mexican drugs dealer.” Of course, the prisoners don’t need to burrow if they could just burn as was seen in this case. Why after the first fire were we’re still rebuilding with wood? That is akin to inviting trouble and wondering why it came over.

He further went on to ask, “Should the comfort of prisoners be our priority? Should we close down another sugar estate to get at least a $2B from there to offset expenses? That would be absolute trouble.” Yes, relocation of the prison would have been expensive. However, if the first riot taught us anything, it was that we were ill-equipped to deal with such unrest, particularly when we are dealing with buildings that are largely unsafe and men that are largely unstable. This incident could have been prevented.

I reckon my priorities and the government’s are different, but the prison issue was one that was of urgency since last year and should have been treated as such. We do need a more secure and isolated prison, but we should not look at this issue in isolation. The fire should not have happened. Wickham’s death should not have happened. Not so close on the heels of last year’s fire when we had commissions of inquiries and various ideas touted to make the system better. A programme that was to be launched at the Marriott Hotel this week has been cancelled since the fire. The programme was said to be one that would have helped to increase the use of alternative sentencing and reducing the number of pre-trial detention of prisoners. Bail sums that keep the innocent and/or poor from being able to leave the prison system and draconian sentences for marijuana possession, a plant which has far and staggeringly less ill effects than cigarettes.

The fact that matters concerning the prison and its poor occupants were being launched at the monument of corruption that is the Marriott was not something that was lost on me. It is quite an irony, but it is good that something was being done. This at least shows that the issue was not one that had faded out of their minds. This however, was not and is not enough. We need judicial reforms and legislation decriminalising marijuana because a significant number of persons are arrested every year on marijuana-related charges. Those inquiries should have borne fruit of operational procedures that would have seen such incidents being more effectively dealt with.

Twenty-two non-violent prisoners that have shown good behaviour have so far been released. These prisoners should have been released long ago and not only in the face of tragedy. This government’s practice of placing band-aids over glaring, open wounds will ultimately be its downfall.