Kampala — The announcement by the police commissioner in charge of community affairs, Mr Asan Kasingye indicating that juvenile offenders will no longer be locked in the same cells as adult suspects is within reason.

For too long it has been a major contradiction that the criminal justice system in Uganda tended to pay lip service to this sensitive business. It goes against common decency to jail minors with hardcore adult suspects/convicts. The corrupting influence of this procedure cannot be overstated.

The Uganda Police Force, under the firm leadership of Maj. Ben. Katumba Wamala, has shown itself to be more responsive to public hue and cry. This latest decision is significant because it brings Uganda in consonance with internationally accepted practices in dealing with youthful profligacy.

Children's rights activists will be excited by this development. But there is still the business of adequate facilities at reception centres where juveniles are supposed to be held either on remand or to serve their sentences.

Last month, a judge in Mbale was shocked by the abhorrent conditions prevailing in a remand home there - a malady afflicting such facilities across the country.

This facet of the juvenile correctional system has to addressed in a comprehensive manner. Equal attention needs to be given to policy on incarceration and the making of minimum standards in such institutions the norm.

The alternative is delude ourselves that simply barracking these misled youth is enough. Students of crime and punishment are urged to recognise the importance of psychological re-adjustment if the convicted criminal is expected to re-enter society as a transformed individual. The juvenile homes do not have to be the hellish prisons they are today. Those youth who go through these institutions would benefit from their incarceration if it was a largely educative experience and not seen only as a punishment for a crime committed.

Our police force is in the best position to lead the lobbying for a measurable change in the child reception centres. The Force deals with children on a daily basis and it must be frustrating to see offenders not changing their ways simply because the system does not work as it should.