The Department of Correctional Services advocates about the dangers of crime at Westbury high, Coronationville secondary and Chris J Botha Senior Secondary School
Four inmates from the Leeuwkop Medium C Correctional Prison also graced the programme.
“Your problem is that you make us heroes for the wrong things that we do, you want to worship those in the locations who are going wrong, we are not here for that…You are in control of your choices, but you are not in control of the consequences,” said inmate Ayoob Toffie during his talk with learners at the Westbury Youth Centre.
On August 15, the Department of Correctional Services together with four inmates from the Leeuwkop Medium C Correctional Prison visited Westbury to talk to learners from Westbury high, Coronationville secondary and Chris J Botha Senior Secondary School.
Pule Leeu who is the head of the correctional centre said: “The opportunity that you have today will never come again. You cannot touch the same water twice. We are here to talk about change for the better.”
The programme started with a prayer by Toffie and then the inmates shared their stories. Nicholas Lengwati who is from Alexandra township is serving 12 years for armed robbery.
“Before I even entered prison, I thought everything that I heard was just a joke, when I got to prison, I saw an older man sleeping with a youngster, it was not good for my eyes, I then saw another one stabbing another prisoner for cigarettes, it’s not the kind of life that I would want you to experience. You all have a choice. What do you want to do with your life? At 12pm, I have to eat my supper, at 3pm I have to go sleep, you have a choice, I believe that you can be better people,” said Lengwati.
Sithembiso Muldudzi who is also from Alexandra township is serving a 30 year sentence for a number of robberies.
He explained that sometimes one feels the need to adopt the bad lifestyle that of their siblings, he had brothers who were famous for the crimes they did and felt that he needed to carry those titles too.
Muldudzi explained: “You think that you are invincible and that you can do anything because you are so ‘good’ at what you do. It finally caught up with me, all the robberies that I have done, all the cars, the nice fancy lifestyle that we lived is gone, we now in shackles. We are living a life now where there is fights every day, stabbings, rapes every day or every second day, there are people who wake up in there with no vision for their lives and you ask yourself ‘why am I here’.
“Be fortunate enough to learn from the mistakes of others and don’t repeat them. I had the opportunity to not be in prison many times but the fact that I thought I could by-pass the law every time resulted in me being in prison, now I have to live in prison for a very long time.” The third inmate was Jeffrey Ralebofu from Tembisa who shared: “The ‘cool’ that we wanted to be is not the correct ‘cool’, some of you do these wrong things because you want to be cool and impress other people.
“Your parents work so hard for you in hopes that you make something good out of your life not knowing that at school you are writing an application to come into prison. We are not here to scare you, we just don’t want you to be in the place where we are, but it is your choice.”
Toffie who is from Westbury is currently serving a double-life sentence plus 16 years in prison for cash-in-transit (CIT) heists. Toffie has served 17 years so far. The learners started applauding for Toffie when they heard the length of his sentence and Toffie stopped them because he didn’t want them to look at him as a hero. He then called his daughter to explain the depth of his story. “I was addicted to the crime, I was addicted to money and to a cellphone, I worshipped these two things.
“Two people lost their lives because of my addiction for money. The crime that I committed gave me R800 000, I had more money in cash at home than what this crime paid me, so I didn’t do this crime because I wanted the money, I did it because I was addicted,” said Toffie.
The inmate shared more with the learners and thereafter Themba Lukhele, an ex-offender who is now an author, businessman, motivational speaker, aspiring musician and philanthropist shared his story too. A question and answer session was also held where learners and residents had the opportunity to ask the inmates questions.
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