ANC Youth League Bids for Private Prisons

Via NY Transfer News Collective * All the News that Doesn't Fit

source: Green Left Weekly #298 11/19/97


ANC Youth League bids for private prisons
By Norm Dixon

The African National Congress Youth League has put a new spin on the
slogan ``From the politics of liberation to the politics of
reconstruction''. 

According to the November 8 Johannesburg Star, the ANCYL is bidding for a
multimillion-rand contract to operate two private prisons, including an
Orwellian-titled ``youth development facility'' in the eastern Mpumalanga
province. 

ANC MP Andries Nel told the government's correctional services committee
that the ANC Youth League's trade and investment company is part of a
consortium bidding for the projects. 

Under South Africa's new Correctional Services Amendment Act, private
contractors can be appointed to finance, design, build and run four
prisons as part of a pilot project. Each private prison could generate up
to 50 million rand (US$10 million) annually over 25 years. 

South Africa's prisons are filled to more than double their capacity. The
government has approved a plan to house convicts on ships anchored off the
coast and has floated proposals for inner-city Johannesburg office towers
and abandoned gold mines to be converted into jails. 

                             -30-

Six-month airmail subscriptions (22 issues) to Green Left Weekly
are available for A$80 (North America) and A$90 (South America,
Europe & Africa) from PO Box 394, Broadway NSW 2007, Australia
http://www.peg.apc.org/~greenleft/  e-mail: greenleft@peg.apc.org   
 
=================================================================
  NY Transfer News Collective   *   A Service of Blythe Systems 
           Since 1985 - Information for the Rest of Us          
              339 Lafayette St., New York, NY 10012             
  http://www.blythe.org                  e-mail: nyt@blythe.org 
=================================================================
 
nytaf-11.22.97-01:27:49-23254