Pretoria - Corrections and Civil Rights Movement president and former convict Golden Miles Bhudu was arrested on Tuesday for dressing up in a prison issue uniform.
Department of Correctional Services spokesman Logan Maistry said Bhudu had breached sections of the Correctional Services Act, which says: “Any unauthorised person who wears or uses the prescribed sentenced offender dress or anything deceptively resembling them is guilty of an offence and liable on conviction to a fine or, in default of payment, to incarceration for a period not exceeding 18 months or to such incarceration without the option of a fine, or both.”
The SAPS was investigating the matter, Maistry said. “Bhudu was arrested at the High Court of South Africa Gauteng Division, Pretoria,” he said.
The 52-year-old has been at the centre of controversy before, once being arrested for aiding the escape of an Israeli national while he was being transported for deportation from South Africa.
He has for years appeared in public wearing prison uniforms or in chains, ostensibly as part of his campaign to highlight conditions in South African prisons, raising possible questions about the timing of his arrest.
He registered as a political party at national level in 2010, which will participate in the elections next week. It has two constitutions – one for those in jail and one for those outside jail.
The party says it wants to unite people against crime and act as a political and human rights watchdog over the criminal justice cluster.
Bhudu has spoken out against favouritism in jail and is supporting prisoners being released under what he calls the “right” conditions.
Pretoria News