Lologo Prison Service Training Centre

Off to Lologo Prison Service Training Center this morning. 8 of us crammed into one Japanese SUV, over amazingly bumpy roads to the outskirts of town. Through miles of communities of grass huts and roadside stands, scavenging goats, women and children carrying firewood and buckets of water on their heads.

Went by a store front shack that had the most incredible sign out front: Juba Safe Life Pharmacy and Laboratory Services. Open sewer in front, no bigger than twelve feet by twelve feet, filthy, no electricity, goats in front. Couldn’t stop to take a picture. Too bad. And we complain about health care in Canada!

The training centre is situated on a slight rise (the breeze is nice) on the site of a former juvenile facility (youth are now in the main prison with the adults). The buildings are bombed out after the war. No doors, no glass in the windows. Bare, dirty, scarred concrete with graffiti, and the only four classrooms are inside this building. The UN is building new facilities on site, but until then, students use classrooms with no electricity and live in tents. Pit toilets.

The women and children in the pictures are family of students. All students are former soldiers and the course is four weeks. The picture of the cooking is the “kitchen”. There are 750 students on site, divided into 8 groups. Half drill in the morning outside while the others are in the four classrooms. They switch after lunch. No workbooks as literacy is a massive issue. The only instructional aid is a blackboard.