Deputy Minister visits Bethal
Mr Thabang Makwetla talked about skills development.
BETHAL – Deputy Minister Mr Thabang Makwetla recently visited Bethal Correctional Services to discuss problems in the management area.
He was accompanied by Member of Parliament, Mr Pat Sibande, and Acting Deputy Regional Commissioner, Mr Ruth Letsoalo.
The mission of the minister was to find innovative ways to address challenges in department.
He wanted to examine and be acquainted with the management area’s operational level and challenges to be outline to find possible solutions to these pitfalls.
Mr Sunnyboy Mndawe, Bethal Area Commissioner, presented the problems, such as a high vacancy level.
The Minister was impressed with the level of operations in areas such as social reintegration and parole board where figures exceeded set target and remain consistent in both quarters.
The other area he was impressed with was the vast increase in work performance in the community projects.
The Food Gardening Project is a joint venture with the Department of Agriculture and the Department of Labour where unemployed youths, parolees and school children harvest and donate vegetables to surrounding hospitals, schools and drop-in centres.
“This is to alleviate poverty,” said a member.
He however highlighted that a lot of hard work needs to be put into the skills development areas.
“Workshops, agricultural activities and education are low in figures,” he said.
Mr Makwetla further pointed out that it is important for the department to give its officials first preference in recruitment by advertising jobs internally before advertising externally.
During his closing remarks he said the department must be accessible to the community.
“Offenders should be involved in skills development programmes for the community to ease the pressure of unemployment and for them to be able to fend for themselves when they get released.
He also urged officials to market their department in order to make the community aware of all operations.
According to him the community should know how the parole board operates, social reintegration and what is meant by rehabilitation.
He concluded by saying Bethal Management Area should return to its old ways of using offender labour, but in a humane way, not the punitive and inhumane way of the apartheid era.
Bethal’s area is known for its outstanding work in successfully rehabilitating and reintegrating offenders with a record of 98 per cent compliance to parole conditions by parolees in the past three years.
After the presentation the Deputy Minister went to the women’s section where they engaged with offenders and also visited the art gallery stall prepared by offenders.
“I am impressed with the work done by the offenders and encourages them to carry on doing good work.”
The offenders’ choir performed for Mr Makweta who said he wants to see the choir perform at next year’s Grahamstown Arts Festival.
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