WHEN a woman is sent to prison, the punishment rarely ends with her alone.
For many women in Zimbabwe and across Sub-Saharan Africa, imprisonment carries an invisible sentence for their children.
Infants and toddlers often accompany their mothers to prison, not because they have committed any offence, but because there is nowhere else for them to go.
These children, sometimes called “consequential prisoners,” serve time by circumstance, not by choice. Their presence behind bars raises an urgent question for policymakers and society alike: is prison ever an acceptable place for a child?
Globally, an estimated 19 000 children live in prisons with incarcerated parents, usually their mothers.
Sub-Saharan Africa accounts for a significant share, although precise figures are difficult to obtain.
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In Zimbabwe, recent reports indicate that 24 babies were living with their mothers at Chikurubi Female Prison alone by the end of 2025 — the highest number recorded at that facility since it opened in 1970.
While the numbers may appear small, the implications for child development and rights are profound.
The reason children end up in prison is usually practical. Many African legal systems allow mothers to keep infants with them for a limited period to facilitate breastfeeding and bonding.
More critically, alternatives are often absent. Extended family networks are strained by poverty and formal foster care systems are underdeveloped. Faced with a stark choice between separation and co-residence in prison, authorities frequently opt for the latter as the “lesser evil”. Yet this choice carries serious consequences.
Prisons are fundamentally punitive environments, ill-suited for early childhood development. Across the region, women’s prisons are overcrowded and under-resourced.
Reports from Zimbabwe and neighbouring countries describe inadequate nutrition, limited access to healthcare and a lack of safe spaces for play and stimulation.
Children may be exposed to violence, illness and psychological stress, experiences that can have lasting developmental effects. A toddler who spends their formative years behind bars may struggle to adjust to life outside, while the stigma of having “grown up in prison” can follow them long after release.
International and regional law strongly cautions against this practice. The United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child affirms that children should not be deprived of liberty except as a last resort.
The Bangkok Rules of 2010, which focus on women offenders, stress that decisions about children staying with imprisoned mothers must be guided by the child’s best interests and that such children must never be treated as prisoners.
Crucially, Rule 64 of the Bangkok Rules urges States to prefer non-custodial sentences for pregnant women and mothers of young children, reserving imprisonment for serious or violent offences.
Africa goes further. Article 30 of the African Charter on the Rights and Welfare of the Child states that a mother “shall not be imprisoned with her child,” reflecting a strong normative position that children do not belong in prisons.
Zimbabwe’s legal framework sits uneasily within this landscape. The Prisons and Correctional Services Act allows infants to remain with their mothers until the age of 59 months and obliges the State to provide food and necessities for a limited period.
The Constitution recognises that the best interests of the child are paramount. More recently, the 2023 Sentencing Guidelines Regulations have taken an important step by directing courts to consider non-custodial sentences for pregnant women and mothers with dependent children.
Yet gaps persist between law and practice. Mothers are still imprisoned for non-violent, poverty-driven offences, without adequate consideration of care-giving responsibilities. Child welfare assessments at sentencing remain inconsistent and social services are often brought in too late, if at all. The result is that prison becomes the default child-care arrangement for the poorest families.
There are promising alternatives. Zimbabwe’s establishment of the Marondera Female Open Prison in 2021 shows what is possible when rehabilitation and family ties are prioritised.
Open prisons, community service, suspended sentences and restorative justice programmes can hold offenders accountable without severing the mother-child bond.
Other countries offer lessons too: Malawi’s proposed prison reforms place strict limits on children’s presence in custody, while the United Kingdom now treats pregnancy and early motherhood as exceptional circumstances that should generally preclude imprisonment.
Ultimately, the question is not whether mothers should be held accountable for crimes, but how.
A justice system that incarcerates infants alongside their mothers punishes the innocent and undermines children’s rights from the very start of life. Implementing the spirit of Rule 64 of the Bangkok Rules would mean reimagining sentencing through a child-centred lens — one that recognises that protecting children today is an investment in society’s future.
- Chinga Govhati is a child protection advocate and can be contacted on chingagovhati@gmail.com.
- Pamellah Musimwa is a child rights lawyer and is contacted on pmusimwa@gmail.com