Cape Town — The South African Police Services (SAPS) and the Department of Correctional Services (DCS) conducted a raid at the Sun City Correctional Facilities in Johannesburg.
During the raid, several expensive contraband were seized including cellphones, PlayStation consoles, TV sets, drugs and weapons. The raid, which happened on Wednesday night, was led by Department of Correctional Services head, Makgothi Samuel Thobakgale, IOL reported.
Thobakgale said the correctional services officials at the facility need to give answers.
““Firstly, we start with unit managers. In every unit, there is a unit manager who now needs to account for what we found here. The second thing is to tighten security especially around the movement (that is) movements to court, movements to hospitals and even movements inside the centre,” he said.
[WATCH] The Correctional Services department is carrying out a raid at the Johannesburg correctional facility this evening.
The search is aimed at rooting out the smuggling of contraband within the prison.
A viral video on social media has recently ignited a heated discussion… pic.twitter.com/hnM48ra617
— Newzroom Afrika (@Newzroom405) July 24, 2024
The commissioner said overcrowding is within prisons across South Africa is contributing towards the contraband problems in South Africa and he said it is difficult to search for these smuggled items.
“Most of these offenders what they do, they hide contraband in objects where you will not think they will hide them. Others will hide them inside television sets, that is why we have taken them. We have to unscrew and see what is inside. They hide them (contraband) in containers of what they use to bath or as toiletries,” said Thobakgale.
“They hide them inside food containers. In instances where they are also able to make provisions, they hide them in mattresses so that is why you see we had to search even the mattresses and pillows,” he added.
According to EWN, Thobakgale said there will be consequences for the managers and that people will need to answer for what was found. He added that the security in and around the facility will be tightened.
“Movements to court, movements to hospitals, movements even inside the centre. These movements are the ones that provide an opportunity for these contrabands to be exchanged,” he said.
21:40 Prisoners at Sun City correctional facility are pulled out of their cells as officials remove contrabands hidden behind toilet seats, under bed mattresses, inside pillow cases ….@News24#PrisonRaid pic.twitter.com/Xe3zYaq9hf
— Noxolo Sibiya (@NoxieSibiya) July 24, 2024
Baie dankie Oom Groenewald. Ek waardeer.
The Correctional Services department carried out a raid at the Johannesburg correctional facility, Sun City, last night. These are some of the contrabands they found:– flat screen plasma televisions
– play stations
– WiFi routers
-… pic.twitter.com/LS01LBNm1G— Poppy Mathobela (@PopMathobela) July 25, 2024
[WATCH] Inside one of the many large shared prison cells at ‘Sun City’ where officials are checking each individual bunk bed.
The raid is intended to check that inmates are not keeping any contraband.#KayaNews #prisonraid pic.twitter.com/TCcPC3dxXh
— Kaya News (@KayaNews) July 24, 2024
Follow African Insider on Facebook, Twitter and Instagram
Picture: X/@Angelique4luv
For more African news, visit Africaninsider.com
Compiled by Matthew Petersen
