Articles and Related Media

Penitentiary Reform in Benin
The Limits of Ways, Means and Willingness

By Serge Trouillard, Metropolitan Montreal District, Lafontaine Area
(December 2002)

n the 1990s, Benin and the Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) as part of a best correctional practice exchange initiative.

Under this MOU, a CSC delegation and a delegation from Benin's penitentiary administration branch exchanged visits in 1999 and 2000. After these meetings, the two parties developed a work plan that included posting a CSC manager to Benin for six months. This was how my involvement in this international project from October 2001 to March 2002 came about, and I would like to share some of my experiences with you.

As technical advisor to Benin's Director, Penitentiary Administration, and the Department of Justice, Legislation and Human Rights, my role was to assess the situation and develop a strategy for supporting the Benin side, while determining the nature and scope of any assistance that Canada could offer.

Benin: A Few Features
Benin is a country of some 110,000 km2 and approximately six million inhabitants, located on the west coast of Africa. Its capital city is Porto Novo, but its largest urban centre is Cotonou, located less than 100 km from the capital.

The official language is French, although dozens of different dialects are spoken in the different regions. Politically, the country operates by a democratic, presidential system that includes a National Assembly of representatives from the various official parties. The administrative and judicial procedures in force derive from those established by France during colonization.

Structure of the Correctional System
Benin has eight prisons, five of them located in the southern part of the country (Cotonou, Porto Novo, Lokossa, Ouidah and Abomey), one in the centre (Parakou) and two in the north (Kandi and Natitingou). Each prison is attached to a Courthouse and serves as a jail for the accused (under investigation by the examining magistrate) and for prisoners on remand (accused awaiting a decision) as well as a prison or central holding area (for the custody of the convicted) . The Code of Criminal Procedure and the Decree of 1973 on the penitentiary system state that persons charged and on remand should be kept apart from those convicted, although this requirement is not enforced because the existing set-up of the premises prevents it.

The Cotonou, Porto Novo, Ouidah, Abomey and Parakou institutions are outdated and the conditions of confinement there are very harsh. Three of the eight prisons--Lokossa, Kandi and Natitingou--were built in 1997-98 and their conditions of confinement are relatively acceptable in compared to the infrastructures of other centres. Inmates at these institutions sleep in communal dormitories, the largest of which can accommodate 75 residents, and overpopulation is less a problem than in the other prisons.

For the most part, officers of the National Guard, led by a Superintendent in charge of the prison, are assigned to supervise inmates. The number of officers assigned to each of the centres varies. Until quite recently, staff included one head guard, one brigade leader and four to eight officers, on average. The Cotonou prison held 1,700 inmates, with a staff of eleven officers and back up from a group of fifteen or so soldiers.

Prison Population and Conditions of Confinement
At the start of the year, the number of inmates had climbed to 4,600 despite the fact that there was official available space to accommodate only 1,600. Of that number, only 30% had been convicted, while the others were on remand or charged and awaiting trial, sometimes for several months or years. The reason concerns abuses, to say the least, of the remand procedure as well as a sluggish judicial process. The number of inmates on remand was 176 (4% of the total), and only 8 of them had been convicted (4.5%). In addition, this figure included 51 minors at the time, most of them in city prisons and only one of them convicted.

Overcrowding entails many consequences, including promiscuity, assaults, infectious and contagious diseases, no space for educational or recreational activities, and sometimes, no place even to sleep.

The infrastructures of many of these prisons lack even the minimal services required in terms of showers, washrooms for all of the inmates, or even adequate ventilation or the barest protection against mosquitoes. The cramped dormitories, once shut and locked for the night, contain from 75 to 200 inmates or more, in living conditions that almost defy description.

Penitentiary Administration provides inmates with only one meal a day, through private canteens. Residents must rely on help from relatives, acquaintances or other inmates to top up their food supply. Money is freely used in Benin's prisons, which allows for buying and selling among inmates. In some prisons, chickens and goats share the premises with inmates and sometimes allow them to improve their daily lot.

Inmates are also permitted to engage in farming at a number of institutions outside the cities; in theory, the harvest is meant to be shared among all penitentiary residents.

Future Outlook
Apart from conducting an exhaustive assessment of various aspects of Benin's Penitentiary Administration, CSC's role during this posting was to offer support and advice concerning daily operations.

Also, in collaboration with representatives of Penitentiary Administration managers and certain non-governmental organizations (NGOs), an action plan was developed to support penitentiary reform in Benin. Unfortunately, now and for the past few years, almost no significant, tangible action has been taken or undertaken by the Department of Justice, Legislation and Human Rights that shows any signs of a willingness to improve conditions in Benin's prisons, especially in terms of the health, sanitation and occupations of inmates.

The almost total lack of financial or material resources allocated to the Penitentiary Administration, despite urgent demands, is another indicator of the priority placed on the penitentiary system. It therefore seems highly likely that unless the Department of Justice, Legislation and Human Rights proceeds with some of the proposed changes, CSC's support for penitentiary reform in Benin will be low-key. We can only hope that circumstances will foster a more concrete continuation of Benin-CSC collaboration in future years.

I remain convinced that CSC's expertise and experience in employee training, correctional operations, human resources, human rights and personal dignity would be a major asset, if not vital components, of penitentiary reform in Benin.