In recent months, with colleagues from the Judicial Inspectorate for Correctional Services (JICS), I have visited prisons in Durban, Pietermaritzburg, Vryheid and Newcastle. In each, disturbing evidence of dilapidation confronted us. Leaks, floods, broken windows, unrepaired electric installations, stinking ablutions. It was dismal, the more so because all the degradation we saw could readily be […]

Street life is hard: drugs, crime, gangsterism, and prostitution— all kinds of horrible things. What makes it difficult is that you don’t have shelter, and you don’t even know when and what your next meal will be. You have to hustle for survival. I was introduced to street life by a friend who fed his […]

Mental Health is about the way you think and feel and your ability to deal with ups and downs, and unexpected tum arounds that often have us each bound down behind these lines of misunderstanding. Mental Health, Substance Abuse or Co-occuring challenges and their recovery processes are an all day, every day continual struggle, often for life. […]

Prison Journalism Project trains incarcerated writers to become journalists and publishes their stories. Subscribe to Inside Story to receive exclusive behind-the-scene looks at our best stories, as well as author profiles and other insights. Should you wish to assist in the rehabilitation of former inmates and help put money into the pockets of those who have struggled […]

For nine months of my life, I was free, A period known as lying in my mother’s womb. As for birth, it was a period lived without seeing the truth. It would come to be, only incarcerated I found my truth. I was lucky to find myself locked up as an adult rather than in […]

Prison Journalism Project trains incarcerated writers to become journalists and publishes their stories. Subscribe to Inside Story to receive exclusive behind-the-scene looks at our best stories, as well as author profiles and other insights. Squishington. He — or possibly she — was the first pet I’ve had during my life sentence. I found him in the prison […]

Behind closed doors however, it was a more disruptive environment saddled with depression, alcoholism and drug usage to self-medicate from unresolved childhood issues stemming from abuse, abandonment and identity crisis. I was raised by my maternal grandmother from the age of three in a predominately white but diverse neighborhood which stunted my Black education and Black identity. Coming […]

The South African has taken another step in its Prison Journalism Programme collaboration with Restore. Last Saturday, 1 July 2023, the publication and Restore – a non-governmental organisation (NGO) based in Cape Town – held a virtual writing training session for a group of formerly incarcerated men and women. ALSO READ: ‘The South African’ partners with Restore for Prison Journalism Programme […]

Prison Journalism Project trains incarcerated writers to become journalists and publishes their stories. Subscribe to Inside Story to receive exclusive behind-the-scene looks at our best stories, as well as author profiles and other insights. There are so many times I have not been treated like a woman in a women’s prison. Times when I have felt less […]

“We can not consider ourselves to be abolitionists, yet work to uphold the system we’re said to be abolishing…” especially when we continue to drain our communities every 15 minute collect phone call; messages sent, letters posted asking, often demanding J-Pays like the addict stealing Christmas presents from the children we claim to love. ACCOUNTABILITY […]

Prison Journalism Project trains incarcerated writers to become journalists and publishes their stories. Subscribe to Inside Story to receive exclusive behind-the-scene looks at our best stories, as well as author profiles and other insights. It was my first morning waking up in prison. My day had started at dawn the previous day, so I had slept hard […]

This article was originally published by Jermaine Nomdoe. My first time in prison, it felt like I was lost, but as time goes on, I got used to it. But then, I met two wonderful ladies who did the restorative justice classes with the inmates in prison. Then, I decided to join them. Afterwards, I […]