Over 80% of sentenced inmates enrolled in corrective programmes

Prisoners enrolled in occupational skills training recorded a 100% success rate in the 2025-26 financial year.

This was just one of the stats reported by the Department of Correctional Service (DCS) during a portfolio committee meeting on Tuesday.

However, Minister Pieter Groenewald warned that this was not related to parolee application approvals or recidivism levels.

More than 166 000 inmates in SA

As per the department’s presentation, South Africa has a prison population of 166 008, split between 104 117 sentenced inmates and 61 575 remanded inmates awaiting verdicts and sentencing.  

At least 96% of those inmates were male, with 24 837 inmates being between the ages of 18 and 25–24 123 men and 714 women.

Offenders are included in corrective programmes based on individual needs, social worker assessments and placement tests for educational courses.

Just over 83 980 inmates were enrolled in correctional programmes in the 204-25 financial year, with 81 575 successful. That is a success rate of 98%, well above Correctional Services’ 84% target.

For occupational skills training, 38,921 were enrolled, and every inmate successfully completed the programme.

Just under 7 000 inmates were enrolled in educational courses, with the department recording over 96% success rate for the grade 12 and FET programmes each.

A further 6 548 partook in workshop and agriculture programmes, with 5684 completing in the 2025-26 financial year.

Corrective programmes also include victim-offender dialogues, spiritual programmes and anger management courses.

More resources wanted

Due to the high uptake and success rate of inmates, the number of school facilities run by DCS increased from 17 to 19 in the last year.

The department also introduced a telematics project, an online digital technology resource designed to create engaging and relevant learning experiences.

“An average of 1 700 offenders per day have participated in production workshops, meanwhile, 4 004 offenders per day have participated in agriculture,” stated DCS.

However, the department listed a caseload ratio of one social worker for every 240 inmates, making it “impossible to reach the sentenced offender population”.

Additionally, overcrowding and insufficient funds were cited as challenges to providing more inmates with corrective resources.

Psychological reports key

The department did not disclose how many parolees who completed corrective courses were rearrested.

Groenewald did explain that successfully completed corrective programmes were not a shortcut to early release or a barometer of successful integration.

“Yes, you can have a parolee or applicant for parole that went through all the rehabilitation courses and the whole process, but then you get a certain psychologist’s report and a criminologist’s report that determine the risk of the applicant reoffending,” said Groenewald.

“If the risk is mild to high, I do not approve because that means there is a good chance for reoffending for that applicant,” he concluded.

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