Lusaka — HOME affairs minister Lt Gen Ronnie Shikapwasha has urged the Zambia Prison Service to observe prisoners' human rights while they are in custody.

In a speech read on his behalf by deputy home affairs minister, Kennedy Sakeni at the 34th senior prison officers' conference in Lusaka yesterday, Lt Gen Shikapwasha said the main function of the prison service was the safe and humane custody of the inmates.

"The government therefore expects delivery of this national service from your organisation without excuse. This service implies non-violation of human rights of prisoners when they are in custody," Shikapwasha said.

Shikapwasha said the observance of discipline in the service was of great importance and encouraged all officers to adhere to discipline.

"The cornerstone of any success in any organisation is good discipline. It is therefore incumbent upon each and every prison officer regardless of rank and file to adhere to the code of discipline that is permissible in the organisation", he said.

Lt Gen Shikapwasha encouraged the officers to reflect on issues concerning the HIV/AIDS pandemic and to find intervention measures to reduce the prevalence of the disease among the staff and their families.

He said work should be done towards the completion of the Mwembeshi prison so that other prisons such as those in Lusaka are decongested.

Speaking at the same function, Commissioner of Prisons, Jethro Mumbuwa said the service was crippled by the population at prisons, which inhibited them from carrying out their duties effectively.

Mumbuwa said among the inhibitions were over crowding in prisons and the dilapidated prison infrastructure.

"Due to congestion in our penal institutions, the service has found it practically impossible to classify the inmates accordingly as required by the United Nations International Minimum standard rules for the treatment of prisoners and Cap 97 of the laws of Zambia," Mumbuwa said.

He said most of the prisons were built during the colonial era and were meant to accommodate only 3,000 prisoners as opposed to the current prison population of 13,000.

He said the issue of overcrowding coupled with shortage of beddings, poor kitchen and dining facilities had led to the spread of diseases.

Mumbuwa bemoaned the low staff levels that the service was undergoing which had led to a big disparity in ratio between staff and prisoners.

"Instead of the legal ratio of one officer to four prisoners, the ratio is now one to fourteen. This makes it difficult to effectively and efficiently supervise prisoners and sometimes has resulted to prisoners escaping," he said.

He reported that the prison service had recorded some achievements in 2003 among which are 187 per cent increase in the maize harvest and the export of baby corn to the United Kingdom, which realised K24 million.

He appealed to the government to consider providing agricultural equipment to the prison service so as to increase output in farming.

"Although the service has the potential to grow more food to feed the whole prison population and remain with enough surplus for sale, this can however not be actualised due to lack of agriculture machinery. While the service appreciates manual labour, the service also realises that agricultural machinery is key," he said.

Mumbuwa stressed the need for the government to purchase vehicles for the police service to ease problems of transportation of remandees to court.

Meanwhile, a former prisoner has bemoaned the water problems currently being experienced at Lusaka Central Prison.

Parazenga Mtonga, who was on the death row before being pardoned by President Mwanawasa in 2002, said the prison had water problems for three weeks.

He said the sanitary conditions were so bad that an outbreak of cholera was looming.