My election day in prison
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Presidential election 2013 was the first time in Georgia when prisons werent on high alert during the elections day. All media outlets, if they had been accredited at the Central Election Commission, could go to the prisons and observe the polling process there, any time during the day. That was when I first time ever entered a prison.
After going through a very thorough security check, one of the guards accompanied us to the Gldani #8 prison polling station. Besides our photographer and me, there were two USA embassy and one local observer organization representatives with us.
On the wall of a long corridor which led to the voting station, there were posters of one of the presidential candidates. Well, now that was a violation. No political advertising is allowed at the polling station during the elections day. Later on, on our way back, we noticed that the posters had already been removed. Oh, well.
The polling station was surprisingly overcrowded. Besides the voters and election commission members, there were a lot of policemen and security guards there.
The first thing that attracted my attention and that I wasnt expecting at all was the prisoners outfits. They all looked dressed up nicely!
Really? Do prisoners have both "domestic and "outgoing clothing, too? And the election (or just an opportunity to meet new people) was so important event for them that they put their outgoing clothes on for that day? Or maybe thats their everyday clothing, the way how theyre trying to lighten the gloomy prison environment Who knows? To know the truth, I need them to let me in on a regular day, too.
As soon as we entered, all the journalists were asked to not take a picture or a video showing prisoners faces without asking for a prior permission from them. Almost all the prisoners preferred not to show their faces.
Voting process was going on peacefully, with no complications. Later that day, I visited a regular polling station, too, and I couldnt tell the difference between the voting processes in the two places.
By the way, first time I went to (but never entered) the prison was in 2012, after the prison rape scandal blast out in Georgia. Once the secret videos had been revealed, students started gathering near Gldani #8 prison in Tbilisi to show their support to the prisoners.
Later that night, I watched a video on Facebook, showing a prisoner screaming through the window of Rustavi (a city situated 25km southeast of the capital Tbilisi) prison, asking whether the students would go to his prison, too, or not. Next morning, two of my friends and I decided to go to Rustavi and support the prisoners in that prison, too. We organized a meeting in Rustavi and created a Facebook event, which about 200 users joined.
Eventually, three of us holding a lot of whistles and posters, ended up to be standing alone in front of the prison, in the semi-desert fields of Rustavi, because no one else came. But hey, prisoners, showing themselves through the small windows, seemed to be cheered up and that was the purpose.
You might remember Nelson Mandelas very famous phrase that "no one truly knows a nation until one has been inside its jails. A nation should not be judged by how it treats its highest citizens, but its lowest ones.
Being able to attend the election process both in a jail and regular polling station as well and see that the prisoners and other citizens outside had been treated equally well, during the elections, at least - was a pretty nice experience, which journalists could have this year for the first time.