Throughout the history of humanity, faith has been used as a rehabilitation tool as well as a tool of hope.
The use of prison religious programmes therefore presents a unique opportunity to channel inmates into the straight and narrow. In this regard, faith is used as a tool for the rehabilitation of inmates in prison owing to the restrictive and restorative qualities it has had in the course of history.
This is the model that ‘Crime Si Poa Kenya’ a non-governmental organization that focuses on the holistic reformation and transformation of people in conflict with the law for seamless reintegration into the community upon release, in partnership with the Kenya Prisons Thika Main Prison, focused on as they held a spiritual session with Pastor John Nderitu from Trinity Baptist Church.
The session centred on nurturing spiritual resilience, offering hope, teaching the inmates to embrace the teachings of God and encouraging them to learn from their experiences.
“Religion plays a huge role in restructuring the lives of several inmates. The concept of prison ministry is the support of the inmates’ religious and spiritual beliefs. This gives them faith as a tool to hold on to in times when they need it the most. Many times, this gives the inmates a new purpose in life and helps them to re-establish the lost beliefs in themselves, share their uplifting experiences with other inmates, and cope with the brutality of prison life,” said Peter Ouko, the Programme Director.
“I was locked up in Kamiti prison for 18 years for alleged murder charges and it was a difficult period for me. I lost time with my family and was robbed of my freedom and it was my faith that kept me going through those years. When I was released, I founded the Crime Si Poa organisation with the aim of encouraging other felons like me not to give up, as there is life even after conviction and this is why we are here today,” he said.
“It is possible to rehabilitate a criminal into a life in which they contribute to themselves and to society and the success of such programmes is mostly achieved by use of the faith paradigm, such that after their release, cases of prisoners re-offending will be low. By using the faith paradigm, inmates are encouraged to adopt moral values that help achieve a minimum degree of re-offending. We have also observed that faith based criminal rehabilitation is able to realize this much more than any other programs that have been used before,” said Ruth Achieng, a prison officer at Thika Main Prison.
“Spirituality is the foundation of any change in a human being and unless this is achieved a person cannot be saved. Faith provides a moral compass for the inmates, and those that embrace it easily fit into rehabilitation programs within the prisons. We remain committed to promoting holistic and positive change within correctional facilities and recognize the importance of faith in the rehabilitation process,” she said.
Ordinarily, when people are convicted of whatever crime they might have committed the spiritual part of humanity often receives little regard. It is thus important that the convicting agencies be reminded of this in the course of their noble correctional duties. This is because before the outer person is convicted, the inner person has already been in contemplation. This calls for an expert in handling the inner person, and this is the chaplain, whose role is to correct the inner person for outward uprightness, said Pastor John Nderitu during the session.
The Kenya Prison Rehabilitation programme is a programme that is used to reform offenders in prison. The programme consists of designed training activities that include vocational trainings that are mandatory, like carpentry and masonry, while others are optional like sports, hobbies and motivational activities carried out to reform offenders. The offenders are taken through the activities by prison wardens and counsellors who supervise and record their progress irrespective of the crime they have committed.
A study conducted by Egerton University in 2019 on the influence of the Kenya prison rehabilitation programme on the reformation of offenders at Kamiti maximum prison in Nairobi County found that the attitude of offenders towards crime significantly changed as they went through the rehabilitation programme.
Majority of the offenders (72.4 percent) perceived the rehabilitation programme as being beneficial to them, while 57 percent of prison wardens and counsellors reported that the rehabilitation programme could be useful in reducing crime re-offense rates. The study concluded that offenders acquired new skills and changed their attitude towards the crime committed and therefore became upright members of society once released from prison.
By Hellen Lunalo
