The justice minister of the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), Constant Mutamba, announced on Saturday the release of 527 prisoners from the central prison of Makala, DRC on X (formerly Twitter).

Mutamba delivered 2,000 mattresses and ordered 7,000 mattresses to improve the detention conditions of prisoners, and said that prisoners in the DRC eat two to three times a day.

In an effort to reduce prison overcrowding, the Congolese government announced in July that at least 7,000 prisoners will be given conditional release from Makala Central Prison.

The UN has pledged to support the DRC in reforming the penitentiary regime by assisting in the stabilisation and improvement of the prison system and safeguarding the rights of prisoners.

Makala’s central prison has the capacity to accommodate 1,500 prisoners. According to Amnesty International, detention centres are overcrowded. Some prisoners starve to death and are not provided with adequate food and medicine.

The DRC has endured two major wars, a multitude of tribal conflicts, and other instances of armed violence since the end of the Mobutu autocracy in 1997. In recent years, the DRC has battled conflicts in the eastern Nord-Kivu province bordering Uganda and Rwanda as well as various tribal conflicts that have killed thousands of civilians. 

A new prison is to be built on the outskirts of the capital, of which Makala is the only civilian penitentiary. The DRC government’s latest actions are part of a larger call to modernise the nation’s penal system and protect human rights in detention centres.