Cibitoke: more than 150 detainees in a custody with a capacity of 40

With a capacity of 40 detainees, the custody of the provincial police station of Cibitoke (north-west Burundi) housed, until Friday, September 6, 159 people, including a dozen minors. The prison conditions of the detainees are “unbearable”, according to human rights defenders who are crying scandal. INFO SOS Médias Burundi

Concordant sources met at the provincial police station speak of “terrible promiscuity”: the detainees sleep standing up and do not even have enough space to make a small passage to the toilets.

“All the business is done on the site and the risk of catching diseases from dirty hands is very high in a context marked by monkey pox,” laments a security source on condition of anonymity.

Most of the detainees suffer from malnutrition, as indicated by a nurse met on site.

Access to this custody is also conditional: you have to pay between 2,000 and 5,000 francs in bribes to the police officers guarding the dungeon to be able to visit a detainee.

In addition, any new detainee is ordered to give 50,000 francs, called “candle” in the detainees’ jargon.

This sum is shared between the police officers and those responsible for the detainees.

The latter, according to a police source, are mostly accused of simple offences such as theft from households and fields.

While the time of pretrial detention should not exceed 14 days in a police cell in particular, it is common to find detainees who spend 3 or even 5 months there.

Corruption is found at all levels.

Relatives of detainees report that some magistrates receive bribes that even push them to release detainees accused of murder or rape.

“For stealing a mobile phone that costs less than 50,000 francs, a young man has just spent two months in this cell,” deplores a human rights defender who has been established for a decade in the provincial capital.

He is making an urgent appeal to the administrative and judicial authorities to release detainees incarcerated without valid reasons.

This human rights defender, whose opinion is shared with all the detainees, also speaks of arbitrary arrests and incarcerations.

Relatives, parents and neighbors of the detainees urge the hierarchy to both “discourage irresponsible behavior and punish certain police officers guilty of corruption”.

The public prosecutor in Cibitoke speaks in particular of problems of transport to transfer prisoners already convicted to the Mpimba prison. The central prison of Mpimba is located in the commercial city of Bujumbura.

He calls on the intervention of the governor of Cibitoke to ask for help from humanitarians.

“The latter will be able to support the transport of prisoners from the provincial police cell to relieve congestion because it only has a capacity of 40 to 50 prisoners but which, most of the time, houses more than a hundred people”.

A human rights defender urges the CNIDH (National Independent Human Rights Commission) to intervene to assert the rights of prisoners and advocate for the release of those who are unjustly incarcerated there.