The lock down at St Albans prison outside Port Elizabeth is slowly being lifted after three inmates were killed and around 20 prisoners and officials injured during violent clashes on Boxing Day.
Eastern Cape Correctional Services Provincial Commissioner Nkosinathi Breakfast told AlgoaFM News that offenders are being allowed to phone their families again, as well as receive visitors, but that authorities are not yet ready to allow prisoners out into the exercise areas.
During the fight, 13 correctional services staff were injured, six of them critically.
Breakfast said the officials who were injured are recovering slowly, but they will need ongoing psychological support. They are all out of hospital. Some are back at work already while others are recuperating at home.
Breakfast said the key long-term issues that are being addressed at St Albans are those of rehabilitation of offenders, overcrowding, gangsterism and staff shortages.
He said talks with offenders in the wake of the Boxing Day tragedy were ongoing.
