More than 22,000 foreigners worsen overcrowding in SA's prisons

Most are in for robbery and illegal immigration but 690 have life sentences

The chair of the portfolio committee on correctional services, Kgomotso Ramolobeng, has raised concerns about overcrowding in prisons, highlighting the significant contribution of foreign nationals to the issue.

During a recent parliamentary briefing, Ramolobeng revealed that as of March last year, 22,612 foreign inmates were being held in correctional facilities, with 690 serving life sentences.

Ramolobeng said the department conducted oversight visits to Gauteng correctional facilities in October and found that most of the facilities housed foreign nationals, primarily incarcerated for robbery and illegal immigration.

“When we went to the Baviaanspoort juvenile centre, we found about 525 male offenders in that facility. Out of the 525, 400 were foreign nationals and only 125 were South Africans,” she said.

“In the Kgosi Mampuru Correctional Facility, there were 2,394 foreigners.  In the Joburg correctional facility, formerly known as Sun City, we found 4,709 foreign national inmates. This is a dire concern for the department.”

She highlighted that the department now houses about 156,000 inmates, despite having only 105,474 beds available in the 2023/24 financial year.

Other issues that contribute to overcrowding include inmates who have been granted bail but cannot afford to pay, inmates who should be in mental institutions and a large number of foreigners in prisons, she said.

Ramolobeng said the department was implementing various strategies to address overcrowding. “These include managing levels of awaiting trials, managing levels of sentenced offenders by improving the use of community correction supervision, the release on parole, and transfers between correctional centres to establish some degree of evenness and reduce overcrowding in all our centres.

“It also involves encouraging debate among South Africans about the value of incarceration as a sentence and promoting appropriate sentences that are focused more on rehabilitation.”

She added that the department was working with the department of home affairs to deport foreign inmates who have been granted parole and sent back to their countries of origin.

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