Nairobi — Life grinds painfully slowly for university graduate teacher Peter Karichu who was sent to jail for seven years by a Naivasha court in 2003 for handling stolen property.

The frustrated man now nicknamed 'headmaster' by fellow inmates spends his time in a small clattered classroom in the heart of the Nakuru GK Prison, teaching other inmates, including those preparing to sit the Kenya Certificate of Primary Education.

Peter Karichu, a graduate teacher who is serving seven years at the Nakuru Prison where he has been teaching other inmates for the past three years as he awaits the hearing of his appeal.

One of his students Katee Munyoki Hilary scored a B+ in KCPE last year and Karichu hopes that his students will produce even better results this year.

But the sweet education story for the inmates has a sting in the tail. Karichu does not intend to spend the seven years in cryptic dungeons offering free education. He is hoping against hope that his appeal will be heard and the doors of freedom opened. Three years behind bars, he told the Nation on Friday, was like a lifetime.

Short supply

Even with the assistance of prison officers such as Mr Kennedy Mwambua who is assigned fulltime teaching duties by the Prison, the numbers of inmates who are thirsty for education is overwhelming and books and stationery in short supply.

The small library which also serves the Prison staff is poorly equipped and most of the available text books donated by churches and other organisations are not relevant to the KCPE syllabus.

The officer in charge of the Prison Senior Superintendent Bernard Ngonini, who allowed us into penal institution, said that everything possible was being done to rehabilitate the inmates in spite of their overwhelming numbers and limitation of resources.

The Prison, which was established in the early 60s to hold about 800 prisoners, had 1,929 by last week and more were still being funnelled in daily by courts.

Of the 1,929 inmates, only 872 were convicts while the rest comprised those on remand awaiting trial. Some of the remandees we talked to were aged between 12 and 73.

Twelve-year-old Boniface Mwangi landed in the Prison two weeks ago after he denied stealing 20kgs of dry maize at Moronyo area in the outskirts of Nakuru Town. His is a misdemeanour but there was no one to stand surety for him.

Holding blocks

Timothy Kamau, 70, who was arrested in February last year in Njoro for alleged rape said he, likewise, had no one to stand surety for him. He will have to remain in the congested holding blocks until his case is heard and determined.

Both holding blocks that were designed for 80 people each were by last week accommodating a total of 649 inmates.

"You have to sleep standing most of the time because there is no room on the ground to lie down," one of the inmates said. Many remandees claimed that the hearing of their cases was hampered by the prosecution whose witnesses failed to turn up in court either because they were on duty elsewhere or had been transferred to other stations.

Benjamin Otwere complained that he had been in the prison since 2002 but only a single prosecution witness had testified while capital remandee Godffrey Kariuki claimed that his trial was still pending because of the various adjournments the prosecution had managed to obtain since 2000. He was arrested in 1999.

Cleophas Chisanya who was charged with forgery in 2002 said that only three prosecution witnesses had testified.

He claimed that when magistrates went for mention of cases at the Prison, some files could not be found and that this affected the fixing of hearing dates.

"If your case is not heard on the scheduled date, you have to wait for at least another four months before the trial can resume. Probation officers are not also producing their reports on the scheduled dates and this results in long delays," said another remand prisoner.

Another capital offence remandee asked, "Why is the hearing of the Tom Cholmondeley case being pushed so fast while some of us have been waiting for eight years and the cases against us have not started?"

Mr Samuel Ndatho, an official involved in the rehabilitation of inmates, agreed with Mr Ngonini that deliberate measures undertaken by the Prisons Department to change the prisoners into productive citizens were yielding fruit.

Honest living

Many inmates who entered the prison without any skills that could enable them earn honest living were now graduating after acquiring carpentry, masonry, tailoring and other skills.

Harrison Maina who landed in the prison for three years for dealing in bhang (Cannabis sativa) has learnt sign writing at the Prison and now holds a Government Grade 3 certificate in that trade. "I will not go back to crime after completing my sentence. What I have learnt here will make me enough money to enable me live like other honest Kenyans out there," Mr Maina who was found working on a signboard for the Prisons Department said.

Bernard Oduor, who was jailed for five and a half years for rape, will be leaving the Prison in July having sat and passed a Government Tailoring Grade I test.

"We only need money to buy our own sewing machines when we leave and I don't think anyone can ever think of getting involved in crime again," he said.

Derrick Korir and Daniel Nyongesa have also acquired skills in carpentry and plan to start life as good citizens when they complete their terms.

Inmates at the neighbouring Women's Prison are also being taught skills such as embroidery, knitting, tailoring and managing hair salons.

According to Mrs Leah Mukora, who is in charge of the Women's Prison, inmates had also showed great interest in pursuing education and six of them would be sitting KCPE exams this year.

MS Alice Chongwo, a Prison's officer who teaches inmates, said that five of them did KCPE exams last year while others sat for various Government Grade Tests.

Unlike the male prison that is bursting at the seams with prisoners, the women's prison had only 206 inmates (126 convicts and 80 remandees) by last week. 24 of them are still with their children who were too young to be entrusted to other people when their mothers were jailed.