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WANYJOK - 31 Jan 2013

South Sudan county prison short on food

Wanyjok Prison in Aweil East County faces a severe food shortage and lack of space. Women prisoners also complained of filth, lice, and lack of a latrine.

The prison authority of Northern Bahr el Ghazal state in an interview with Radio Tamazuj on Tuesday acknowledged the food shortage saying it had to do with a prisons contractor.

Deputy Director of Wanyjok Prison Major Piol Majok Wek said that prisoners face a serious food shortage because the state ministry of interior failed to pay the food suppliers who signed a four-year contract to supply them with food items.

Piol explained that Wundit Trading Company for Investment has ran short of food because the company's money for four years has not been paid. The contractor said, “There is no money to purchase food again until the debts are paid,” Piol reported.

He also mentioned that, “our prison premises are based inside the market which makes it difficult for the prison guard to deal with the criminals that escape from the prison because of the overcrowding in the market.”

Piol narrated that the killers and people with minor cases are combined in one room due to lack of space. He said that instead killers should be kept in one place.

“We sent many reports asking the state government to reallocate the prison from market centre to another place that is not overcrowded but we have no reply up till now.”

Meanwhile, Akec Atem, a woman prisoner who was sentenced for three months for committing adultery with another man said, “We have no latrine, no sleeping rooms and the lice are biting on us day and night.”

Another women name Angum Dut Dut who killed a fellow woman said she spent five years in prison with the unsettled case in the court. She said she used to sleep just on the floor, had no soap for washing her clothes, and poor food. She also has a kidney problem, she said, and there is no treatment. 

File photo: A prison in Raja County, South Sudan (Radio Tamazuj)

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