Mugabe pardons 2000 prisoners

Zimbabwe will free some 2,000 convicts from 42 prisons under a special presidential clemency order, Zimbabwe’s news agency New Ziana reported. 

Zimbabwe Prisons and Correctional Services (ZPCS) deputy commissioner Huggins Machingauta said at a press briefing on Sunday that the first group of prisoners will be released on Monday.

“The provisional number or prisoners to be released is 1,727 but we expect the number to reach 2,000 by the end of the week,” he said.

The clemency will benefit all female prisoners except those sentenced to death and are serving life sentence. All juveniles below 18 years old regardless of the offence they committed, and prisoners aged 70 years and above as of June 30 last year except those on death row, will also be pardoned.

Prisoners serving at open prisons and those certified to be terminally ill will also be released. However, convicts serving time for serious crimes including murder, rape, carjacking and armed robbery will not benefit under the clemency.

The presidential amnesty is hoped to ease overcrowding in prisons across the country, whose population stands at 18,980 against a 17,000 holding capacity. Bernama