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Raising management
capacities of the albanian prison governors and
high manamgent of the General Directorate of
Prisons[1]
 On
11-13 December 2007, the Albanian Helsinki
Committee (AHC) organized a workshop on some
strategic issues related to high management of
the penitentiary institutions aiming at raising
the professional capacities of the high
management level of the penitentiary
institutions. The workshop was attended by high
officials of the General Directorate of Prisons
(GDP) and all the governors of the prison and
pre-trial detention institutions. The Deputy
General Director Mr. Lulzim Kodra opened this
event. The international experts invited in this
workshop were Mr. Jacques van Huet and Mr. Cees
Boeij, both prison regional governors in the
Dutch Agency of Correctional Institutions. Mrs.
Edlira Papavangjeli, Program’s Manager moderated
the whole activity.
This workshop
focused on translating different international
rules and recommendations in the penitentiary
area by prison staff into practice in their
penitentiary institutions; planning and control;
delegation of mandates and the implementation of
the Code of Conduct for penitentiary staff in
the daily practice.
 Taking
into consideration the fact that a considerable
number of governors were new or with little
experience in their leading positions in the
penitentiary institutions, they were acquainted
with the main principles of the European Rules
and what they mean in practice related to the
services provided to the persons deprived of
their liberty in the penal institutions.
Furthermore, a special attention was given to
the findings and recommendations of the
Committee of Prevention of Torture’s (CPT)
reports on Albania to spot out and work on the
concerning issues of failure of respect of these
international rules and principles in the daily
practice in the penitentiary institutions. These
issues were treated in working groups having in
mind the role of the high management in ensuring
that the prison administration abides to these
international norms in their daily practice and
deal with these issues to the benefit of the
persons deprived of their liberty.
The Planning and
Control was another issue of interest for all
the governors treated in this workshop. The
model of Planning and Control was offered to the
participants, what it means in concrete terms
the whole cycle of planning, implementation,
control and adoption to the new context in the
process of financial management. The main
concerning priorities and concerns were
highlighted by participants and recommendations
were offered in this regard to improve the
present situation. Delegation of mandates from
the high to the middle management level was also
a very important topic treated in this workshop.
Experts treated the concept of the proper
mandates delegation in the penitentiary
institutions and actions to change mentalities
from a total control of the depending
institutions to a mentality of trust and proper
delegation of mandates and control. The Quality
Management Model was also introduced and
explained to the participants as a tool to
measure the effectiveness and efficiency of the
organization.
The implementation
of the Code of Conduct by all the prison
administration was the last topic treated in
this workshop. Some work has already been done
recently in this regard, nevertheless further
concrete work should be done to ensure the
acquaintance of this Code from the moment of
recruitment of new personnel working in
penitentiary institutions to the daily practice
in their everyday contact with the persons
deprived of their liberty and with the
colleagues in the se institutions.
AHC, its experts
and all the participants agreed to bring to the
attention of the high authorities in the
Ministry of Justice and the GDP on some specific
issues of concern related to the topics treated
in this workshop as well as relevant
recommendations which you can find below:
-
The staff in
the penitentiary institutions should be
updated on the conclusions and
recommendations of the monitoring reports
from international organisms such as CPT or
other national bodies like People’s
Advocate, AHC etc.
-
The governors
of the penitentiary institutions should turn
the concerns highlighted in these reports
and their recommendations to concrete
working plans with concrete measures for
specific areas in a time schedule. That way
the prison administration will be able to
show what the progress is done in relation
to these reports’ recommendations;
-
The financial
planning and control should be done in SMART
terms[2],
the role of the governors in this process
should be increased in this process,
therefore more consultation is needed not
only with the financial persons responsible
in the institutions but also wit the
governors and the GDP;
-
Decentralizing
certain budget items so that some competence
over the use of these items is given to the
local governors in order to increase the
efficiency to respond to the needs of their
own institutions;
-
Regarding the
better management of the budget, the
governors see it as very important to have
competences to use the secondary
income/revenues generated by the work
already conducted in their own institutions;
-
With regard to
the delegation of competences, high
management should develop internal
transparent procedures for the delegation of
competences to the responsible staff in the
institutions including here decision taking
from the part of the staff on behalf of the
prison governor, while the latter stays
responsible for the entire time for
everything happening in her/his institution;
-
Penitentiary
institutions should know more on the Quality
Management model in the future and take
appropriate actions to make this Model
implemented in the penal institutions. AHC
international experts are committed to
elaborate on this issue further in the
future;
-
The
implementation if the Code of Conduct in
penitentiary institutions should be an
ongoing process. Different measures should
be used in this regard like booklets easy to
be accessed by each and everyone in the
penitentiary institutions, during interviews
with potential candidates who apply to work
in prisons, in the daily meetings of the
sections in prisons where a certain time
should be given to the principles of the CC
and concrete cases of daily practice;
transparent mechanism should be available in
the prisons to denounce non-professional
behavior; governors should be good examples
for their staff regarding the observance of
the CC in their daily practice.
AHC hopes that
these recommendations are taken into
consideration in the future with concrete
actions from the part of the Ministry of Justice
and the GDP. The participants in this workshop
evaluated this activity as very valuable for
their work and found that the objectives of this
workshop were fulfilled. Further, some other
topics were brought to the attention of the AHC
to be taken into consideration for the future
workshop with the high management.
[1]
This activity is implemented in the
framework of the program “Managing
prisons in the humane way”, CARDS 2004
financed by E.C. delegation in Tirana.
[2]
SMART stands for Specific, Measurable,
Achievable, Realistic and Time limited.
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