Close to 800 murder suspects in Malawi have been awaiting trial for a long time, some of them for as long as 15 years, a government body overseeing prisons said in a report on Tuesday.

The Malawi Inspectorate of Prisons criticised the government for failing to try 763 suspects, some of whom have been waiting for years, saying it was a “gross violation of human rights”.

In its report, the inspectorate expressed “concern that some of these prisoners have been on remand since the mid-1990s.”

“It is a gross violation of human rights to hold a suspect on remand for such a long time without trial,” the report said.

The prisons inspectorate noted that most of the inmates held without trial were in urban prisons and that their detention for such a long time “contributes to congestion at these prisons”.

It said the government was “not making any effort in financing the trial of homicide cases and is relying on donors to provide the necessary funding”.

Malawi’s 23 prisons are overcrowded, housing 9 220 inmates in space built to accomodate 4 500.

The prisons inspectorate, chaired by a senior supreme court judge and which also includes a Catholic priest and top prison officials, said overcrowding continues to be a serious problem.

“The only lasting solution to the problem lies in the construction of new prison structures in seven districts where none exist,” the report said.

Three notorious prisons, including the infamous Mikuyu in Zomba, the former colonial capital city in the south, have re-opened as part of a plan to ease overcrowding.

Former president Bakili Muluzi ordered the closure of Mikuyu and two others, and the release of all political prisoners when he took the oath of office in 1994, ending three decades of iron-fisted rule under Kamuzu Banda.

Banda used the prisons to punish and detain opponents without trial. – Sapa-AFP

Source: Daily Mail & Guardian
URL: http://www.mg.co.za/articlepage.aspx?area=/br…/p>