Detainees petition President on long detention without trail or sentence
James Debono Foreign prisoners have increased by nine percentage points since May 2008 when the foreign population at Corradino stood at 31%.
200 of the 499 inmates currently imprisoned hail from foreign countries, and now stand at 40% of the inmates’ population.
Libya, Nigeria and Somalia are presently the most represented foreign nationalities in prison. 85 prisoners hail from sub-Saharan African countries, while 48 hail from the North Africa.
Prison rights’ spokesman George Busuttil, of Mid-Dlam ghad-Dawl, claims that many of these people end up in prison because they cannot pay their bail, sometimes because they do not have a fixed residence. He also noted that many of these prisoners rely on legal aid provided by the State.
While a large number of cases involving foreigners are drug-related, a number of prisoners – especially those from sub-Saharan Africa – are serving six-month prison sentences after being caught residing illegally in Malta.
Busuttil expressed concern about the general increase of the prison population, which has now reached the 500 mark. The number of prisoners has increased from 414 in 2008 to 499 in 2009. “The problem is not the number of foreign prisoners – which has always hovered around 35% – but the continuous increase in the number of prisoners. Like other prisons in European countries, Corradino is bursting with prisoners,” Busuttil said.
Detainees’ petition Mid-Dlam Ghad-Dawl yesterday presented a petition signed by some 50 foreign detainees to the President of the Republic, calling for a “stop to the inhuman and unjust incarceration of foreign detainees without trial or sentence.”
“This inexcusable practice is a classic example of justice delayed being justice denied. Being a lawyer, this should be a very sad, disturbing issue to you. A person is always innocent in the eyes of the law until proven guilty in the court of law, based on a reasonable time limit. This important first commandment of the Judeo-Christian principle of law seems to have been purposely ignored in the Maltese justice system as applied only to foreigners.”
The detainees pointed out the example of Kalif Ahmed Eid, a Somali who was accused of importing the plant khat to Malta, and imprisoned for six months. “This could have been a normal situation in any civilised country but the problem here in Malta is that he actually spent 34 calendar months in detention before he was tried and sentenced. This is the norm rather than the exception with justice in Malta as applied to foreigners.”
The detainees appealed to Abela to use his office to put an immediate end to the situation. “We humbly suggest that a detainee must be tried within 12 months. If a detainee pleads guilty he must be sentenced immediately so that the correctional and reforming programme starts in earnest, for foreigners and Maltese alike.”
The detainees said that this suggestion was practiced in other countries of the EU, adding that anything beyond 12 months was a “major violation of our human rights and nothing less than mental manipulation and psychological torture.”
Most represented nationalities in prison
Now May 2008
Libya 31 (39)
Nigeria 27 (6)
Somalia 17 (5)
Ivory Coast 13 (0)
Netherlands 10 (4)
Italy 7 (5)
United Kingdom 7 (7)
Turkey 7 (7)
Romania 6 (0)
By geographic location
Sub Saharan Africa 85
North Africa 48
EU countries 40
Non-EU European countries 10
Asia 9
South/Central America 7
North America 1
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