In Summary: Over 7000 inmates in Rwandan Prisons cleared for release but might never get it, As an institution, Rwanda penal and “correctional” system is an abject failure. The conditions in Rwanda jails and prisons virtually ensure psychological impairment and physical deterioration for thousands of men and women each year. Reformation and rehabilitation is the rhetoric; systematic dehumanization is the reality. Public attention is directed only sporadically toward the subhuman conditions that prevail in these institutions, and usually only because the prisoners themselves have risked many more years in confinement after they have served their legal sentence.

Rwanda prisoners

In unprecedented move, the Rwandan news papers have published that over Seven Thousand (7000) inmates will never get back their freedom even after serving their legal sentence.Abagororwa basaga ibihumbi birindwi bahamwe icyaha cya Jenoside yakorewe Abatutsi mu 1994 bafite ibibazo bitandukanye kuri dosiye zabo bishobora gutuma badafungurwa kandi igihano bahawe cyararangiye mu gihe nta gikozwe.

Literally meaning that over 7.000 genocide inmates will never be set free even after serving their legal sentence because their documents are not available or due to legal technicalities in general.

Why should the Rwandan legal system in general fail Rwandans? Why should we still have these legal technicalities after almost 20 years after genocide? Despite the huge sums of money by the government and foreign aid to improve the Rwanda judiciary, still incompetence and failures continue to exist in the Rwanda judicial system.

The Great Lakes Human Rights Link is appealing to the Rwandan government and other non – government human rights organizations, both local and international, to work swiftly and set free those inmates who have served their sentence without further delay.

According to the Rwanda Correctional Services records of 2014, 7099 inmates don’t have full documentations, ironically both the Ministry of Justice officials and their counterparts in the Ministry of Internal Security in which the Rwanda Correctional Services fall, are pointing a finger to each other. This is not a time of finger pointing, it’s time to act swiftly to save humanity and give back freedom those Rwandans.

If the reason that they are not set free is just technicalities, further detention does not only deprive them their fundamental right, but dehumanizes them and their families.

Why can’t they be set free on condition and then follow the so called technicalities while these people have their freedom? The justice principle is that, it’s better to set free 1000 criminals than detaining one innocent person.

Are our learned friends in the Ministry of justice forgetting that Maxim? It’s absurd that the Rwandan officials both in the Ministry of Justice and Internal Affairs are relying on the Red Cross records, moreover, the government officials don’t even keep full records of all the inmates, according to one official Habyarimana  “Uyu munsi usanga abafite iki kibazo ari nk’igihumbi nyuma y’amezi atatu bakaba ibihumbi bitatu, ugasanga n’amakuru watanze mbere ntiyashyizwe muri sisiteme.”

Literally meaning that, today you find the RCS officials have 1000 problems, after 3 months, the problems triple, even the information you give them is not recorded in the system. It is for this reason, that the Great Lakes Human Rights Link is seriously concerned with this deliberate or incompetence of these officials that will fundamentally stain the achievements of the legal system in Rwanda.

The excuse given by some officials that some records are poorly written or some lack the full name or gender, is fundamentally flawed “ Hari ibyemezo byanditse nabi, aho bibeshye ku mazina n’aho bibagiwe gusinya”.

Ati “Ibyo byose ni impamvu zituma umuntu adashobora kuva muri gereza, haba hagomba impapuro zuzuye kandi zimeze neza, icyo nacyo ni ikibazo gikomeye. Abagororwa 4 772 nibo bavuga ko batazi amatariki bafatiweho bwa mbere bajya muri za kasho.”

Why in the first place a person should be detained without a full written statement and the reason, or the offence committed? According to Article 15 of the Rwandan Constitution: Every person has the right to physical and mental integrity.  No one shall be subjected to torture, physical abuse or cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment.

Indeed, the continued detention of these Rwandans does not only violet their fundamental right, but violets the Rwandan Constitution and other International Human Rights agreements that the Rwandan government is a signatory. How does the Rwandan government weigh that risk against the continued detention of over 7000 men and women who might otherwise go free? And isn’t there something distasteful and unsettling about imprisoning people not because they’ve done anything wrong but because of incompetence of some public officials?

Noble Marara.

Secretary General, Great Lakes Human Rights Link

Placide KayitareAFRICADEMOCRACY & FREEDOMSHUMAN RIGHTSJUSTICE AND RECONCILIATIONLATEST NEWSIn Summary: Over 7000 inmates in Rwandan Prisons cleared for release but might never get it, As an institution, Rwanda penal and “correctional” system is an abject failure. The conditions in Rwanda jails and prisons virtually ensure psychological impairment and physical deterioration for thousands of men and women each...PUBLISHING YOUR NEWS WITH CUTTING EDGE STYLE