By Enyichukwu Enemanna
Officials have said security forces have brought situations under control after an attempted prison break at the Malaka Central Prison in Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) early Monday.
In a statement on Monday, the government added that investigation would be carried out on the circumstances surrounding the overnight attempted jailbreak.
According to a Reuters report which quoted a prison inmate, gunshots were heard at about 2:00 am.
Another inmate said he was woken up by the sounds of prisoners outside, followed by heavy gunfire.
“Some wards were opened, others were not, and the soldiers were shooting at everything that moved,” Reuters quoted a third prisoner as saying.
The prison hospital and its administrative building were on fire, a prison official told Reuters on Monday morning, noting that documents may have been destroyed.
Another prison official said no inmate escaped from custody.
“Those who tried to do so were killed,” the official said.
Heritage Times HT reports that prison break is a recurrent decimal in the East African country.
In 2022, two prisoners were killed in Baraka town, South Kivu, during a gunfire exchange between soldiers of the DR Congo national army and inmates during an attempted jailbreak.
Last year June, dozens of prisoners escaped from a jail in Kinshasa’s main prison after after rebels launched an attack, freeing their leader and 50 others.
