Applying five rupee plasters to a festering wound
It was recently reported that army retirees are being recruited to manage prisons. Many cheered that this was a great job.
On the one hand, the work is not bad. It is fair for many to think that prison management is simple for army soldiers who sacrificed their lives to end the thirty-year war. That thinking is based on the logic that if it was possible there, then it is not impossible here.
The prisoners are unarmed citizens. Based on the experiences of army retirees, it is not impossible to manage these prisoners. When a riot breaks out inside the prison, it is not impossible to use snipers to fire two or three shots. The army has also managed the camps built to rehabilitate the rebels who surrendered to the government after the 1971 uprising.
There are already people in the NLD government who have experience as prisoners in such prison camps. Comrade Lal Kantha and Comrade Galappaththi were also detained in the Boossa camp. They both must have had a lot of experience in this regard.
Military retirees to run prisons...
The closest to those who have retired from the army so far are those who joined the army in 2004. These soldiers were the soldiers who faced the peak of the war. It is conceivable that these soldiers would have served in the ranks of corporal or lance corporal by the end of the war.
These soldiers are those who have experienced the horrors of war. Dr. Ruwan Jayatunga has mentioned in his book "The Psychological Impact of War Stress" that some difficulties arise in military members when they re-adapt to society after being on active duty for a long time.
He also says that it is necessary to study the types of problems that may arise when soldiers who participated in the ethnic war that lasted for twenty years in Sri Lanka are re-integrated into society. He further states that, especially the emergence of abnormal conditions such as post-traumatic stress disorder, unemployment due to adaptation problems, economic difficulties, social violence, and the growth of crime are among them.
The art of creating problems that do not exist..
Dr. Ruwan Jayatunga also says that various types of problems may arise when individuals who have been trained for a period of time to give and receive orders are released back into a civilian environment. The authorities should understand that these remarks cannot be ignored.
It was reported that among the officers of the Bandha Police Unit who were murdered in the Negombo Prison were military retirees. It is suspected that the professional overconfidence of these retired soldiers also contributed to their murder. If we pay attention to these insistences and experiences, the recruitment of military retirees into prison service and their training in that profession should be done very responsibly. Otherwise, this proposal may lead to unnecessary problems.
The Prison Crisis Through Scientific Eyes.
"Prisoners are also human" is a sentence written on the wall of the Welikada Prison. Rumi Ruben, a psychiatrist at Karapitiya Hospital, recently conducted a scientific discussion on Theleader.lk about the prisoners in prison. It is as follows.
"......From a neurobiological perspective, factors such as congestion, noise, darkness and lack of sleep cause the level of cortisol, a stress hormone, to rise rapidly in the prisoners' brains. This impairs the prefrontal cortex, which makes logical decisions, and overactivates the amygdala, which controls anger and resentment."
"This shows that the prison crisis is not just bad behavior of bad people, but a natural response of the human mind and body to an abnormal environment. This is a scientific reality that we need to understand very well..."
If the government authorities can understand this reality, they should understand that they cannot control prisoners by threatening them with "Here comes the baby."
Falling into the trap of the operation of justice...
There are 33 prisons in this country. The capacity of these prisons is 18,000. At present, it is said that there are 44,000 in those prisons. In fact, the number of prisoners in prisons increased because of the operation of justice led by former IGP Deshabandu Tennakoon.
In order to protect their jobs, the lower ranks of the police began to ruthlessly arrest and imprison citizens. The pressure exerted by the police officers to get their bosses to sign the police cadres is also great.
The evasions of the magistrates' courts are also a matter that cannot be ignored. The granting or refusal of bail by the courts in Sri Lanka is done under the Bail Act No. 30 of 1997. Section 2 of the said Act explains that the policy to be followed in implementing the provisions of this Act should be to consider granting bail as the rule and refusing to grant bail as the exception.
The scope of action of the magistrates..
However, the scope of action of many magistrates regarding a suspect presented to the court has sometimes been criticized in higher courts. The best case decision in this regard is the 1999 fundamental rights case of Maximus Danny vs. Sirinimal Silva, Chilaw Police OIC.
Shirani Bandaranaike, Dheeratne and Perera, who delivered the verdict in this case, have stated that magistrates also mechanically issue remand orders for suspects based on the needs of the police. Justice Shirani Bandaranaike, who has expressed concern about this situation, has written in the verdict that magistrates should not issue remand orders to satisfy the whims of a criminal investigator or prosecutor.
"Remanding a person is a judicial act and before depriving a person of his or her liberty, the Magistrate must apply his or her judicial mind to the matter. The police or other agencies making the allegations may request the remand of suspects on various grounds, such as whether the suspect has committed a crime, or whether the investigation into the alleged incidents has not yet been completed, or whether the suspect has threatened the alleged party. They do so regularly. However, in such requests, magistrates should not become mere rubber stamps that immediately approve the request. The Magistrate must exercise his or her judicial mind," Justice Shirani Bandaranaike further stated in the judgment.
The intention of the government and the citizens...
The NDA government is also continuing the justice campaign that began under the previous government. It was confirmed in society that those like Tiran Alles and Deshabandu Tennakoon, who launched the justice campaign, carried out that campaign based on a dual need. That confirmation was more clearly socialized because of the anti-corruption and anti-drug discourse released to the society by the NDA government.
The intention of the government and many citizens has also been a drug-free society. Suspects are piling up in prisons because of that intention of the government and citizens. State institutions including the judiciary, police and others have also felt the burden of that intention of the citizens. The work is being done without judging what is right and wrong.
It is in this environment that riots are emerging in prisons. It is meaningless to try to solve the problem while overestimating or underestimating this real situation. Recruiting army retirees to prison service is like putting a five rupee plaster on a festering wound.
The media had recently reported that the government was considering the death penalty for drug offenders. There is a risk that the government will be seriously affected even internationally by taking such hasty decisions.
Failure to recognize the most basic need...
Indeed, creating facilities in prisons is the most basic need to solve this problem. It may be expensive. But the government has a responsibility in this regard. That is, remembering that prisoners are also human beings. Using military force to tame prisoners is likely to lead to more conflicts.
And that is not all. It is also narrow-minded to seek solutions to this problem by discussing it only with military police officers, intelligence officers and prison officers.
It is indeed very important if the government thinks that this should be discussed on a scientific basis. It is imperative to seek advice from even psychiatric experts.
D. Liyanarachchi ✍️
