‘Prison life not so bad for me’

MBABANE – “Prison life is not what people make it out to be,” This was shared by recently-released former Lobamba MP Allen Stewart while narrating his prison experience over the past year.

The former legislator praised the Correctional Services officials for treating him well while he was serving his time. Stewart said the key thing was how one carried themselves while in prison.

ACKNOWLEDGED

He acknowledged that some people have shared that they had horrible experiences while in prison and said in most cases, such individuals were partly to blame as some people tended to be rebellious and did not want to follow instructions from the Correctional officers.

The former MP said what he learnt was that it was important to be respectful and follow the instructions of the Correctional officers instead of being rebellious.

“It is not that they were doing me any favours as a former MP or anything like that. The most important thing is to follow instructions, be respectful ubanike sikhundla sabo because they are doing their job,” he said.

EXPERIENCES

Adding, he said in most cases, people had the tendency to invite trouble by their behaviour, hence the different experiences people had while in prison.

The former legislator said he learnt a lot of new things while serving his sentence. “I learnt a lot of new things while in there some of the things you would never have thought to talk about on a normal day or any other environment,” he said.

He said the time spent in prison also gave him the opportunity to have a self-introspection and reflect but the most important thing for him was the safety of his family.