KEETMANSHOOP – //Kharas Governor Lucia Basson has hailed offenders at the Keetmanshoop correctional facility for repairing tables and chairs for schools in the region.
The offenders have repaired 71 tables and 54 chairs for the education ministry and are ready to do more to ensure that schoolchildren have chairs and desks.
Basson at the Tuesday event was impressed saying this not only benefits the education fraternity but the offenders too.
“This project not only benefits the education directorate in the //Kharas Region but also provides vocational and technical skills to the offenders that will enable offenders to find work or create employment for themselves and their families upon their release,” she said.
Basson encouraged the offenders to keep up the good work, saying there are still a lot of broken school furniture that need to be fixed and she thus looks forward to more projects of such kind in the near future.
She also took a minute to urge the offenders to be disciplined and ensure that they become productive citizens once released and not commit a crime again.
“I encourage you to be disciplined and adhere to the laws that govern you during your confinement and become law-abiding citizens upon your release from custody – if you are released please do not come back here again,” she pleaded.
Keetmanshoop Mayor Gaudentia Kröhne echoed the governor, noting that the benefits of the project are twofold as it benefits both the learners and the offenders, who gain skills.
“The schoolchildren will be the lucky recipients of restored furniture but it will also provide offenders with technical and vocational skills that they can put to good use once they have served their sentences,” she said.
Senior education officer Rehabeam Nakanyala, who spoke on behalf of the region’s education director, expressed his sincere gratitude for the gesture, saying that the directorate had requested an expression of interest for the repair of the broken furniture, but it was unaffordable, taking the current national financial situation into consideration, noting that the repairs were done at no cost.
“The only expenditure that the education directorate incurred was the procurement of the materials and equipment,” he said.
••• Caption (Furniture):
Gratitude… //Kharas Governor Lucia Basson shares a moment with some of the offenders.
Photo: Matheus Hamutenya