New book shines light on women working in Solomon Is prisons

Transcript

WENDY GEBE: They share how they break through this, these moments of working in a male dominated environment where there is no gender equality during those times. And they are the pioneers where they drive this network. Trying to get women's issues to be heard on the higher level and make this gender equality across this organisation.

JENNY MEYER: What sort of a reaction have people had to the book?

WG: I think that they know that there are some women working there have been through this hard times and this prison environment, they think that this place is for the men only to work in. But they realise that women are also working in the prison system and they have gone through big challenges and a lot of things in their lives. Not only in this profession but in their personal lives as well. Especially during the tensions some of them have been through bad times. And the community they know that women also contribute in the correctional system to keep those offenders in and try to contribute to the government as a whole. Because they give their time to be a correctional officer, a prison officer to try and rehabilitate these offenders. So they open their eyes like 'oh we still have some women in this organisation' where they also contribute a lot to the community and the government as a whole.

JM: Okay and do you think that it will inspire young women to participate in that kind of work?

WG: Yes. During the launching there are a lot of women, the young ones where they just came in to work, they are the ones who attended the launching, most of them have compared to the old ones. I can see a lot of young women coming in and they see this work is very inspiring, and they learn something from the older ones, they are so inspired.