With the government signaling plans to transfer prisoners from the overcrowded Georgetown Prison to the Mazaruni Prison, PPP General Secretary Clement Rohee has warned against sending high-profile prisoners to the remote location.
President David Granger, during last week’s broadcast of ‘The Public Interest,’ said that the plan was to move some prisoners to Mazaruni although the government needed to ensure that it was secure.
“…The problems will not be resolved unless there is a massive re-deployment of prisoners from Georgetown particularly… to Mazaruni. Mazaruni has the space and it needs to be reinforced and fortified,” the president said.
When questioned on whether this proposal was made during his tenure as Minister of Home Affairs and how he felt about it, Rohee said the transferal of prisoners was nothing new.
“There are always prisoners moving backward and forward… particularly from the Georgetown Prison to the Mazaruni Prison, especially those who would have been sentenced—because to send remand prisoners to Mazaruni is a cost, because you have to keep bringing them and carrying them and that has strong possibilities of them escaping as well,” he said.
He insisted that this type of arrangement is nothing new but rather is part of an ongoing process within the prison system.
“They have to be careful though that they don’t send the ‘special-watch’ prisoners there,” he said, while adding that some prisoners could be sent to the Lusignan and New Amsterdam prisons.
“Special-watch” prisoners are high-profile prisoners.
