On
Special Assignment this week:
Episode Title: Thai Prisons
Date: Tuesday, 10 March 2009
Time: 21h30
Channel: SABC 3
Some have been there since 1994 and have never spent a day in post-apartheid South Africa. Some have recently been arrested and - if not executed - will face imprisonment for most, if not all of their adult lives.
Unlike most other nations South Africa will not enter into a prisoner transfer treaty with Thailand, or any other country for that matter. In terms of such a treaty, after spending a portion of their sentence in the country where they were convicted South African prisoners abroad would then be repatriated to serve the remainder of their time in their homeland.
Without this agreement they are doomed to remain incarcerated in a foreign country, far from their loved ones, isolated and often forced to endure horrific conditions.
But should we care? Surely we have enough of our own problems with crime on our home turf - not to mention overcrowded prisons - to extend our sympathy to South Africans who have broken the law abroad?
This Special Assignment investigation looks at the situation with specific emphasis on South Africans who've ncarcarated for drug smuggling.
Special Assignment is on SABC3 on Tuesdays at 21h30.