Publication: The Star Issued: Date: 2007-03-06 Reporter: Amelia Naidoo

No Stars, Just Bars for Sickly Shaik, 'The Ordinary Prisoner'

 

Publication 

The Star
Date

2007-03-06

Reporter

 Amelia Naidoo

Web Link

www.thestar.co.za

 

The five-star luxury that Schabir Shaik was rumoured to be enjoying at Westville Prison was nowhere in sight when the National Council of Province's Select Committee on Security and Constitutional Affairs paid a visit.

The committee yesterday embarked on a five-day oversight visit to KwaZulu Natal amid a host of complaints they had received on the services provided by the departments of justice, correctional services and safety and security in centres in the province.

The National Council of Provinces (NCOP) were concerned with the reports of special treatment given to Shaik and calls made to release him from prison on medical grounds.

Shaik cut a folorn figure in his tiny Medium B High Care Unit room resting in bed. Cell number H-312 will be his home until his health improves.

When the delegation arrived at Shaik's cell he appeared irritated but dutifully waved at those who greeted him after getting out of bed.

"My blood pressure is a bit high," was Shaik's barely audible whisper when The Star inquired about his health.

Director Dumisani Makhaye, who is in charge of Medium B, said Shaik's blood pressure was abnormally high and was of concern to his doctors. He had three of his own doctors visiting three times a week as well as a correctional services-appointed doctor.

"When I spoke to him earlier he said he was stressed about his upcoming cases," said Makhaye.

The NCOP committee could see no evidence of luxuries from outside his cell: Shaik was using state-issued bed linen.

On a small table were books, prayer beads and some papers. His air-conditioned cell also contained a television set and a chair.

"Can you see now that he (Shaik) is serving his sentence just like any other prisoner*1," said KwaZulu Natal Commissioner for Correctional Services Nkosinathi Nhleko.

Golden Miles Bhudu, of the SA Prisoners Organisation for Human Rights, remarked that if Shaik's hospitalisation at Westville Prison had happened right from the beginning "then he would not have been in the media spotlight every second day".

With acknowledgements to Amelia Naidoo and The Star.


*1       Not just like any other prisoner - most prisoners have to share up cell with up to 20 other inmates, don't have air-conditioning or their own TV set in their own rooms.

This sounds quite like the conditions Tony Yengeni had in his short sojourn in Malmesbury prison - a private ward in the hospital section