Prisons Commissioner Sterling Stewart has made it clear that both he and his officers, and not prisoners, are in charge of the T&T Prisons Service. Speaking at the inauguration of the new Vision On Mission board and awards ceremony held at the Central Bank Auditorium on St Vincent Street, Port-of-Spain, on Tuesday, Stewart said he intended to keep order in the system and would not bow to pressure from within.
There have been disturbances at both the Golden Grove remand prison and Women’s Prison, in Arouca, over the past weeks in which both prisons officers and inmates were injured.
Delivering a no-nonsense speech before an audience that included government ministers, judicial officers, members of the diplomatic corps and representatives from Non-Governmental Organisations, Stewart said, “Some of them (prisoners) really out ah timing, bad. And, you hearing people talking, talking like if these people here for preaching on the pulpit or for spitting on the sidewalk.
They coming in there (prison) and telling yuh how to run your area. Doh search them, doh touch them, doh talk to them. And then, it have people with better sense supporting them. But with Stewart, it have to have an order. Doh cross the border.”
He lauded the work of Vision On Mission and similar NGOs which stood firm in the battle to save the hearts and minds of inmates. The Prisons Commissioner warned that there was rebellion inside and outside of the prisons system and this was not a matter to be dealt with solely by his officers, but society.
“They are rebelling against authority. That is what we seeing. It is not about Stewart and prison and what we doing. For us to carry out our lawful, legitimate duties, it have enough opposition. It have enough threats to your lives. Your life at risk totally. And, is time people recognise correctional officers and the sacrifice that they have to make on a daily basis, putting their lives at risk. Salute the kind of work that we doing...because when nobody doh want them and cast them out or if the systems fail, they say here Stewart, you’ll fix that for me and send them out better than they came in,” he said.
Justice Minister Prakash Ramadhar, who also spoke at the ceremony, said the time had come for officers of the Prisons Service to stop being treated as a second class division of the national security and justice systems. The line minister said it was easy to provide resources, but without warm bodies and warm hearts, and gentle caring minds and souls to execute the respective duties, nothing could be accomplished.