ZIMBABWE is going through quick transitions, actually it has perfected the art of “fast-tracking” things since the days of the land reform programme at the turn of the millennium.
Now, it wants to reform prison rehabilitation to make prisoners ready for reintegration into society.
It is not clear what has prompted the fresh thinking to improve the lives of what Secretary Hillary Clinton once called “deplorables”.
However, events in the past year or so can give us direction.
The Zimbabwe administration has arrested and incarcerated some senior Zanu PF members.
It is conceivable that during prison visits, family members of the prisoners managed to whisper the prison conditions to higher offices.
Another probable reason is the administration finally waking up to fight corruption in the public sector and quite a number of associates may find themselves inside as the idea of term extension — Vision 2030 — is still on the agenda.
The thought of having a few senior members behind bars jolted Cabinet this week to discuss prisoners’ rehabilitation.
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It was interesting that the government wants to create a whole new government-funded private voluntary organisation (PVO) to do this.
Tuesday’s post-Cabinet statement said: “Government is facilitating the establishment of the pathways to reintegration foundation, a private voluntary organisation to superintend the reintegration process. The foundation will augment the efforts by the Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service through innovative and comprehensive rehabilitation and reintegration initiatives.”
It is envisaged that the PVO will partner the private sector, local and international organisations in developing programmes that meet the needs of inmates and ex-inmates being supported by prison officers and the community.
Among other the things, the project will offer the following: “The programmes will cover the following content: Primary, secondary and tertiary education; community engagement and education; wellness, mental health and psycho-social support; job placement and entrepreneurship support; digital education and e-learning; and the parole system,” Cabinet said.
There are some unexplained reasons why it is necessary to have this project run by a PVO instead of by Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Service.
Is it that the Cabinet has no confidence in ZPCS to do its constitutional mandate?
The answers are not easy to find, but we can speculate that it is another “jobs for the boys” enterprise.
This new PVO is fully-funded by the government.
It means the government has the resources, but ZPCS has no human resources to implement this mammoth project.
The irony of this project is that the government wants to fund education, psycho-social support, job placement, entrepreneurship and digital skills to prisoners — people who have wronged society but can’t do the same for taxpayers’ dependents.
It is a fact that the government has struggled to fund primary education or pay Basic Education Assistance Module funding.
The government is ready to sacrifice the lives of the young ones by denying them education, yet remains ready to rehabilitate prisoners.
Far from it, I’m not arguing that it is bad to reform and rehabilitate prisoners.
I am just arguing the priorities — a system that prioritises prisoners ahead of youths.
Let us for a moment scrutinise what this PVO would be like and who is it answerable to.
This PVO is private. It is under the Public Service, Labour and Social Welfare ministry but not part of it.
How will the public funds allocated to this PVO be audited?
PVOs by their nature select and appoint their own boards and senior executives.
These are not civil servants or subject to public service regulations.
There are many grey areas here.
The government should take Parliament into its confidence on how this PVO will work and be accountable to the august house since it will exist on public funds.
What would be the mechanism of funding this PVO?
Is it that it would receive direct support from the national budget or it will get the money as a sub-grant from the ministry responsible?
These are matters that should be clear from the onset or we end up having an organisation that uses public funds and is accountable to no one.
Having followed the administration since 2017, it is becoming clear that the privatisation agenda is top on its list of priorities.
This has been evidently demonstrated by the setting up of Mutapa Investment Fund (MIF).
The Fund is directly placed in the Office of the President and Cabinet.
Its activities are beyond the reach of Parliament until when it tables its financial affairs to the august House once annually.
This is the same Fund that nearly disposed of POSB in a murky transaction before the deal was exposed, forcing the government to recant its position.
The Fund has since paid a humongous US$1,6 billion to Kuvimba Mining House private investors for their 35% equity.
It remains unclear how the value was arrived at and who was the ultimate beneficiary.
This payment now reflects on the sovereign debt of the country.
What is clear is that the privatisation agenda is increasingly looking like the emergence of oligarchs in Russia.
Such are projects that are opaque and more often than not, the beneficiaries being political elites and acolytes.
Taking the issue of the PVO to run the rehabilitation and reintegration of prisoners into society and placing it in private hands, one can see that the government is preparing the nation for subcontracting of government services.
We have noticed it too in the waste management.
One company now is the private contractor collecting refuse from many urban centres and making a killing from the enterprise.
It is not a wild guess to say; at the end of the day some prisons will be privatised.
Some politically-connected individuals will be running our prisons and doing it for profit.
As the country ponders this turn of events, one thing remains certain — some individuals will be counting the cash in the banks.
There is a need for transparency and accountability to the privatisation agenda.
- Paidamoyo Muzulu is a journalist based in Harare. He writes here in his personal capacity.
