The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

NATIONAL Security Minister Wayne Munroe said his ministry is still pushing for construction to begin on a new high-medium security correctional facility by the end of the year even after finance officials told them to reduce the costs of construction plans.

“We’re still pushing for it because it’s being designed to meet a number of urgent priorities,” he said yesterday before a Cabinet meeting. “One, the Mental Health Act being brought into force. There are components designed directly to that. The continual reports about the conditions of the existing prison, which is what we have, drives us to have to improve it and the need to move from a prison to a correctional facility where we turn out people better than what they were when they went in.”

Mr Munroe revealed in May that the government expanded its construction plans for the corrections facility, moving from a $40m high-medium security facility to a $90m “correctional institution, administrative, housing and medical facility”, inclusive of a virtual court.

However, Acting Corrections Commissioner Doan Cleare told reporters recently that the government had asked officials to reduce the project’s cost.

“Finance has said that it’s not satisfied with the dollars and cents and sent the parties back to come up with something that they may find acceptable,” Mr Munroe said yesterday. “I’m due to have a presentation on that, whether that relates to issues around the scope for instance, asking for VAT or customs duties exemption. That would be matters that would be addressed. But at the end of any procurement, the Ministry of Finance has to be satisfied before it will provide funds and so that is my understanding of what has happened. It is not unusual.”

The state of the prison has been subject to criticism for years.

The 2022 US Human Rights report on The Bahamas said: “Prison conditions were harsh due to overcrowding, inadequate sanitation, poor nutrition, and inadequate medical care. The facility was designed to accommodate 1000 prisoners but was chronically overcrowded. Maximum-security cells for men measured approximately six feet by ten feet and held up to six persons with no mattresses or toilet facilities. Inmates removed human waste by bucket. Prisoners complained of the lack of beds and bedding. Some inmates developed bedsores from lying on bare ground.”