South Africa: economy of visiting

If you have committed a crime or violated prison rules ((fighting, stabbing, possession of cellphone or other contrabands), you are placed in solitary confinement and cannot receive visits for up to 41 days. So your people will be told at the gate that they cannot see you because you are in solitary confinement.

Inmates are moved groups depending on the seriousness of the offense they have committed. If so, one can start in group D for which visits are not allowed for a certain period of time - up to six months, I believe. Then, in group C, it is one day of visit a month, through a glass, for six months. In group B visits always take place through a glass, twice a month for six months. This period can be lengthened if the guards find that you are not disciplined.

Our loved ones had to pay –and still have to— exorbitant prices at the internal kiosk. Prices fluctuated on daily basis, based on how much profit guards wanted to make. There were many irregularities: for the same product, it was sometimes necessary to pay two or even three times the price demanded outside. Money from the kiosk is supposed to be spent in recreational programs (to buy chess boards, soccer balls, volley balls…) for the prisoners to practice an activity. In reality, guards use it for their own sport clubs and leave offenders with no activities to occupy themself with.

In group A, we were entitled to three visits a month lasting 45 minutes to an hour. Officially it’s one hour but at the end of the month, they make it last 45 minutes in order to accommodate larger volumes of relatives. But then it is not properly communicated, if you challenge them they tell you to sit down.

At one point, my girlfriend was facing some difficulties and wanted to talk to me. I applied for two visits with her, but I had already asked to spend more time with my cousins that month so it was not granted. So I was left with one choice: to buy the visit. I bought it from the inmate working at the visits center. I went into the visiting room without handing over my prison card, which tells them I am there, so they can track my one-hour time. I stayed for an hour, and then I gave my card to the monitor, as if I had just arrived. Back in the section, I went to see the guy and gave him 20 Rands.

In the sentenced section, visiting days were weekends and holidays. Visits were 30-minutes long for non-contact groups B and C. Thirty minutes is really short a time when you have things to say, and there is a lot of noise. You repeat a lot; so you speak in a hurry and end up not communicating important things.

When I was waiting for trial, it was the same. Sometimes the speakers did not work and there was a lot of noise. In the end, we would collect the parcels that our relatives had brought and wave good-bye, frustrated, complaining and angry. But there was nothing we could do.

We wore our own clothes in prison. We were not allow to keep more than two pairs, so our loved ones came every week to bring us clothes, food, cosmetics.

The food was bad so it was always better if one could get cereals from outside as they were allowed. But it was not always easy. This is why my girlfriend had brought me those three packets of powder milk and cereals. Guards decided it was too much;
“what is your cheese boy going to do with this”, said the officer, in those terms.

Another time, my uncle brought me four containers of camphor cream, which could have lasted me for a year! But again, it was too much according to the guards.

They allowed him to enter the prison only with two containers. Even though he explained that he didn’t visit me frequently and this amount of cream would go a long way for me, they refused to hear his pleas.

And there were other times like these… In 2010, I registered in a computer course with the International Computer Driving Licence, a long distance international college. To study I needed to have a computer in my possession but the Center did not have any at that time - and I doubt they have one now. We were therefore allowed to have our own computer for which we had to bring a proof of registration. The instructions were given by voice and therefore we needed to have speakers or, even better, headphones. I had a friend outside who had a computer with small speakers, and he offered to give them to me. My uncle brought them but the guard refused the speakers, saying it would be better to buy headphones because speakers were not allowed.

This guard was against inmate’s education, especially if it had to do with computer science.

My uncle had to buy even smaller speakers, and I had to ask him to come the day this guard was off duty. All of this represented a lot of unnecessary and frustrating trips for my loved ones.

It wasn’t easy for my relatives, even once they knew when to visit me. Those who came had to take two or three taxis to get to Johannesburg and then to the Boksburg Correctional Centre. Boksburg was very far. I told them not to come, since I was about to leave, but the elders visited me three times in my two years and eight months stay. It was very sad because it meant that they would spend the whole day travelling to and from the prison.

In Sun City it was worse. The prison is big; it has three different sections for convicted prisoners. When there are not many visitors, one bus takes them from the gate to all three centres.

It takes some time to reach Center C, which is the last one. And once you get there, visitors have to wait for us to be called inside. This can easily take up to two hours, and it is worse at the end of the month: the queue at the gate is very long. It takes two hours to get in and then two hours inside waiting for us.

There were also the body searches. My girlfriend once complained about how the searches at the gate were very humiliating, especially for women.

Guards searched them by fondling their breasts and touched their intimate parts, almost to the point of putting their fingers inside.

This happened mainly if they had confiscated prohibited item before, in which case they conducted thorough body searches on everyone. Other days they were more relaxed and would just blush through.

One day, cosmetics in large bottles were banned. Only those in round small containers were accepted, so that guards could put their fingers in. The day before, somebody had tried to introduce weed inside a tall lotion. They were doing their jobs of course. But this was inconvenient for relatives, who came to see us with products they bought with hard and honest earned cash, but had to stress going back home with the gifts intended for you.

I’m not proud of having put my family and friends through my stay in prison. My people were so frightened by it when they first came in. I remember my girlfriend was so scared that she was shaking. When she saw me smiling at her, she was somehow confused and relieved at the same time. She asked me how I could be so relaxed in this kind of environment, full of scary people, both offenders and guards. I reassured her by saying
“it’s not bad as it seems, there are a lot of guys I know here”.
Then, that seemed to calm her down a bit. And because she was coming in for the first time and I couldn’t tell her what she was allow to bring, she bough me cooked food, KFC.

Coming into prison was very traumatic for my uncle. It reminded him of his stay during the years of apartheid. He was concerned about my wellbeing, asking me about the violence inside. Johannesburg was known during those years for its violence –and still is but now but not bad as before—.

I could see that he scrutinized me, worried, trying to spot bruises. But after we talked for some time, he started to relax and laugh with me.

And I also had a friend and one of my uncles who told me that they would support me with anything I needed while inside, but they would not set a foot in prison because they were scare. I respected their perspective and didn’t try to change it. They never came but, when I asked them something, they would send them through the post or by other means.