Upper West REGSEC visits Wa prison
The Wa Prison is easily recognisable from afar in view of its high walls and colonial architecture. The building is surrounded by very nice flowers, which hides its reputation as a correctional centre for deviants.
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Inside the building is told horrifying tales of murder, violence, robbery, fraud, rape and defilement.
Last week, members of the Upper West Regional Security Council (REGSEC) paid a working visit to the prison and were visibly uncomfortable about the situation in which the prisoners, many of whom were youth, were wasting their lives.
Dressed in their outfit of an all-blue shirt and shorts, the inmates looked well prepared for the visit. They were good natured, probably because the visit was by top security officials in the region who, maybe out of pity, could grant them amnesty.
The compound was clean, prisoner conduct was perfect and prison officers demanded strict adherence to rules.
The chilling accounts by some of the prisoners concerning the circumstances that landed them in jail were pitiful and at the same time contemptuous.
The stories of unintended murders, robberies, spousal battery, rape and defilement were upsetting.
Establishment
The Wa Prison was established in 1920 by the colonial government. At its inception, it could accommodate 15 inmates. Its capacity has now been improved through expansion works of the facility. Even though the expansion works made room for 120 inmates, the facility currently holds 207 inmates – nearly double the required capacity – at the time of the visit by the REGSEC.
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There are about 20 to 25 inmates living in cramped conditions in the nine cells of the prison.
According to the Head of the Wa Prison, Assistant Controller of Prison (ACP) Victor Douchebe, the prison’s infirmary lacks drugs and conditions in the toilets are very poor. Another difficulty is that there are only two training centres, which cannot contain all the prisoners who required vocational training. In addition, he said there was not enough ventilation in the cells.
Average age
ACP Victor Douchebe said the average age of the inmates was 25 years. Many of them were serving long sentences of up to 30 years for manslaughter and armed robbery, while some were serving minimal sentences of two years, mostly for theft.
The Upper West Regional Minister, Alhaji Amin Amidu Sulemani, was worried that a lot of the inmates were able-bodied young men who could have been contributing to the development of the region but for their crimes.
At the weaving and sewing training centres, a number of the inmates had mastered skills in their vocations such that a couple of the officials visiting placed orders for smocks from the impressive handiworks on display.
The most interesting scene in the prison yard was a shed used as a makeshift classroom. It had long, simple tables with chairs. The floor was cemented and a blackboard leaned against a wooden pole. Here inmates were given formal academic training. The blackboard had two statements that summed up the irony in the lives of the inmates, “The downfall of a man is not the end of his life,” and “We were not born criminals, it is society which has made us so”.
When the visiting REGSEC team left the prison, Alhaji Sulemani said a meeting of the regional security council would be held to discuss the challenges the Wa Prison faced.
ACP Douchebe called for urgent attention to be paid to the facility as its precarious conditions did not fit its status as a central prison installation. But a striking situation that left the entourage pondering was why about 60 per cent of the inmates were Fulanis.