Remand prisoners protest case delays

Scores of remandees from Dar es Salaam`s Keko Prison yesterday refused to alight from a truck that had taken them to the Temeke District Court in connection with their cases. The inmates, who were shouting and booing at police officers trying to force them out of the truck, said they would not attend the court sessions because their cases had taken unnecessarily long to determine for reasons they did not know. There was a series of similarly dramatic developments involving remandees in Dar es Salaam and a few other regions some months ago. The crisis was resolved following intervention by a number of cabinet ministers and other authorities. Much the same reasons were given for the action, characterised by calls for fair treatment by the State organs charged with dispensing justice. During yesterday`s protest, just like previously, the inmates were heard shouting that they were fed up with the way they were held in custody for long periods with their cases not attended to while cases involving prominent or well-connected people were dealt with swiftly. The remandees were chanting songs blaming the government and the judiciary for perceived failure to improve the administration of justice and for adjourning their cases unnecessarily. Again, just as previously, they demanded an audience with Prime Minister Edward Lowassa, Constitutional Affairs and Justice minister Mary Nagu and Inspector General of Police Said Mwema. The inmates were later hauled back to Keko after efforts by prison and police officers to make them relent failed. However, later reports said they were eventually returned to the court in police Land Rovers and peacefully alighted. Asked for comment on the bizarre development, a public prosecutor at Temeke Court said he was non-committal. But while the Keko remandees were defiant, their colleagues from Ukonga and Segerea prisons attended court sessions as usual. The inmates` strike in March this year lasted a week and ended after a delegation from the government visited the prisons and addressed the inmates. The first of its kind in the country` s history, it disrupted court business in Arusha, Dar es Salaam, Dodoma, Mwanza and Rukwa regions. The strike was triggered by the bailing out of former Tabora regional commissioner Ukiwaona Ditopile Mzuzuri, currently facing manslaughter charges at the High Court in Dar es Salaam.