Over 400 convicts perform community services at Ministry of Health facilities

The Health Ministry has offered a platform to over 400 inmates released under the ‘Alternative Punishments Programme’ to perform community services.

Out of the 1,713 convicts that benefited from the programme during 2019, 441 served community service at the different institutions operating under the Health Ministry, such as hospitals, health centres and warehouses. This was revealed during a press conference held by the Public Prosecution yesterday to review the prosecution’s annual report.

During the conference, Attorney-General Dr Ali Al Buainain, shared the highlights and statistics of the cases received by the Public Prosecution throughout last year. A video presentation showed that 1,713 convicts last year were handed down punishments other than imprisonment. Sources said 1,048 served the punishments while inside prison, while 665 were released.

These punishments include community service, attending training and rehabilitation programmes, restriction from attending specified locations, electronic surveillance and more. The figures showed that the convicts included 1,495 men, 137 women and 81 juveniles. 441 were employed to serve in Health Ministry, while Transportation and Telecommunications Ministry got   356 convicts and 171 served at the Youth and Sports Affairs Ministry.

Other public sector institutions that hosted the convicts included the Supreme Council for Environment (12), Works, Municipalities Affairs and Urban Planning Ministry (81), Labour and Social Development Ministry (54), Interior Ministry (37), Muharraq Governorate (12), the Civil Service Bureau (4), the Telecommunications Regulatory Authority (1), the National Health Regulatory Authority (1) and more.

As reported earlier, Article 2 of the law mentions that the alternative punishments include community service, house arrest, confinement within a particular place, refraining from entering a particular place or places, undertaking to refrain from menacing or communicating with particular persons or entities, submitting to electronic surveillance, attending rehabilitation and training programmes, and remedying the damage that resulted from the crime.

The law also mentions that the alternative punishments shall only be applicable to prisoners who have served half the term of the sanction or sanctions he/she was sentenced to, to be of good conduct, their release from prison shall not constitute a public security risk, and shall have paid all the financial liabilities handed down against them by a criminal court, unless it is impossible for them to pay for it.

Article 12 of the same law reads: “Any convicted person sentenced to imprisonment of not more than one year or physical coercion may request the Execution Judge to substitute the imprisonment sentence or physical coercion by one or more of the alternative sanctions set forth in Article 2 of this Law. The execution judge shall decide upon such request after hearing the statements of the Public Prosecution.”