Urgent need to reform prisons.

Prisons should be reformatory facilities offering opportunities for convicts to repent and become law abiding citizens on leaving the jail houses.

That ideal situation is lacking in Cameroon as in some cases, keeping even innocent people behind bars for years without trial has been elevated to an act of exhibiting fleeting power.

In a pastoral letter on Monday, Archbishop Samuel Kleda, in unequivocal terms denounced: “The abductions, disappearances, and arbitrary detentions, sometimes carried out without warrants and without informing the families.

“The inhumane detention conditions in several police stations and gendarmerie brigades: overcrowded cells, lack of ventilation, drinking water, hygiene, and food. The prison is overcrowding in several jails, where inmates live in squalor, unsanitary conditions, and insecurity,” he wrote. 

In the letter on the situation of Cameroon's prisons, Archbishop Samuel Kleda launched a “call for conversion with a view to humanising prisons in Cameroon,” especially in the treatment of incarcerated individuals.

He called on the authorities to ensure the legal registration of all arrests and denounced the lengthy periods of pretrial detention, while many prisoners are still awaiting trial. 

He further criticised the dysfunctions of the judicial system, which he said slow down procedures and compromise the right to a fair trial.

The man of God is not the only one drawing the attention of the government and humanity to the hell in Cameroon’s prison. 

 A data, published by the Cameroon Human Rights Commission, CDHC, in  April  last year highlighted the worrying deterioration as prison capacity rose from 19,155 places in 2019 to 20,955 in 2024, while the inmate population jumped from 30,606 to 37,150 over the same period.

It represented a 21.5 % increase in overcrowding in five years, according to the CDHC, which cited judicial delays leading to prolonged pretrial detention and staff shortages as major drivers.

The Ministry of Justice also raised alarm in its Human Rights Report, released in November 2024, reporting another rise in the inmate population: 35,438 detainees in 2023, compared with 32,998 the previous year, an increase of 2,440 people, for a theoretical capacity of 20,955 across the country’s 76 functional prisons.  

In his Pastoral Letter, Archbishop Samuel Kleda explained that the prison is created in the image of Christ. “Christians are therefore called upon to visit, support, and accompany prisoners, without denying the demands of justice.”      

According to the outspoken Archbishop, justice inspired by the Gospel is not limited to punishment. He therefore called on the authorities to put an end to enforced disappearances and secret detentions; to guarantee the legal registration of all arrests; to reform the prison system to better respect human dignity; to develop alternative sentences for minor offenses; to increase the number of judges to expedite judicial proceedings; to create an independent commission tasked with evaluating the functioning of the judicial and prison system, and to strictly enforce the legal time limits for police custody and pretrial detention.

The recommendations of the man of God are not new. They have in the past been raised by several human rights organisations; pointing out that Cameroon's prison conditions are notoriously harsh and life-threatening, defined by severe overcrowding, poor sanitation, inadequate healthcare, and systemic judicial delays.

Some statistics indicate that over 69% of the prison population is held in pre-trial detention, leading to massive congestion. 

The United Nations, UN Committee against Torture in 2024, urged the Cameroonian government to decongest prisons. It recommended that pretrial detention be used “only in exceptional circumstances and for limited periods,” an approach meant to reduce the number of detainees awaiting trial.

To its credit, the government has heeded some of the recommendations to decongest prisons. Last year, it planed major construction, rehabilitation, and expansion works across several prisons in the country.

In November 2025, the Prime Minister, Head of Government, Dr Chief Joseph Dion Ngute, during the presentation of Cameroon’s 2026 economic, financial, social, and cultural programme in Parliament, announced that the State “will create 1,500 additional places in prisons.”

The main prisons of Akonolinga, Centre Region; Ambam, South Region; Poli in Far North Region, and Tignère in Adamawa Region, he said, would receive new infrastructure, aimed at reducing overcrowding. But they remain promises. 

Apart from infrastructure, which remains reeling, part of the solution, which is less costly, as has been recommended by the Ministry of Justice, is also to conduct regular inspections of State Counsels, better monitor prison flows and prevent rights violations.

It was to prevent such rights abuse that in December 2004, the Penitentiary Administration was transferred from the Ministry of Territorial Administration to that of Justice.

Yet, throughout the country, people are still being detained for civil matters such as debts. Conditions for bail in some cases are too difficult to be fulfilled. 

This is even more so because judges are overwhelmed, especially without the Higher Judiciary Council meeting in the past five years.

As the Archbishop has said without mincing words, it is time for an urgent reform of the prisons system to facilitate bail conditions, and punish investigators who fallaciously convert civil matters into misdemeanours, just to be bribed.

Those in authorities once regarded as untouchables did not bother about prison conditions. Some should not forget that tomorrow they too could be prisoners, especially with the scandals smearing many of those in power.

This article was first published in The Guardian Post Edition No:3834 of Wednesday July 01, 2026