Prison’s Crazy Witchcraft Beliefs

THIS piece of information illustrates the bizarre stand of the Ministry of Prisons with regard to how it treats the High Treason prisoners at Windhoek Central Prison. May I say that some of the decisions taken by this Ministry border on lunacy.

Take the example of clothes. High treason suspects are not allowed to send their clothes out for dry cleaning or to be mended by experts outside of prison.When this happens, such clothes are not allowed back inside again. People are suspected of doctoring such clothes with traditional medicine to give prisoners some supernatural powers. This belief is so entrenched that the Ministry receives only new staff for prisoners. A poor prisoner cannot get second-hand donations from outside. Not even blankets. This is because such clothes or items are suspected to have passed through traditional healers. It is surprisingly that even items such as TVs and radios are not allowed in especially if such are old. Talking about radios, these prisoners are not allowed to listen to short-wave radios for some reason. They might listen to some of their leaders talking from outside on Namibia. Because of this, they are just allowed FM radios. I recently visited an uncle of mine in prison and as he was giving me some instructions to give to his relatives outside of prison in terms of what he wanted done at his village, I could not but wonder why I was not allowed to have a small pen and a paper. I had to listen very carefully because I was not allowed to write some reminders so that I can have some reference points when I communicate these instructions.Pens and paper are not allowed with you when you visit these prisoners. If you forgot something, you unfortunately have to visit the prison again to get the information. Can the said Ministry revisit these by-laws? Our courts do not rule or adjudicate on witchcraft. Why should a Ministry so powerful believe in dark forces? Please be reasonable and get rid of these silly rules.Concerned CitizenVia e-mailNote: Name and address provided – Ed