Is work for prisoners a privilege to save them from the demoralizing effects and misery of endless unoccupied hour? Is it something added to a prison sentence to make it harder and more unpleasant, or something which should have a positive value as part of a system of rehabilitation?
Those magistrates who clung to a sentence of hard labour doubtless looked upon strenuous work as an additional punishment. This point of view is widely accepted as right and proper, but it ignores the fact that unwillingness to work is often one of the immediate causes of criminality. To send prisoners back to the outside world, more than ever convinced that labour is an evil to be avoided, it to confirm them in their old way of life. It has been said that the purposed of prison work in a programme of rehabilitation is twofold: training for work and training by work. The prisoner, that is to say, needs to be trained in habits of industry; but over and above this, he will gain immeasurably if it is possible to rouse in him the consciousness of self-mastery and of purpose that the completion of any worthwhile piece of work can give to the doer. He may find the pride of achievement in something more satisfying, and more socially desirable, than crime. But these things can only come when the work itself has a purpose and demands an effort.

  The Save the Children Fund (SCF) was first started in London on 19th May, 1919 by an English woman named Miss Jebb. It is now a worldwide organization, dedicated to helping needy children everywhere. The SCF of Malawi was formed in 1953, under the patronage of His Excellency the Life President Ngawazi Dr. H. Kamuzi Banda. “Our job in Malawi is to give those unfortunate children the rights that are deprived of through no fault of theirs. These are internationally recognized as the ten rights of children and includes protection, care, food and accommodation, and relief, a spokesman for the Fund explained.
One of those who benefited from the help of the Fund is Samuel Mpetechula, a graduate of Chancellor. His sponsorship started in 1967. The SCF of Malawi found him sponsors. They were Mr. and Mrs. Sutton of Australia who paid is school fees and continued to help him financially throughout his University education. Mr. Mpetechula said, ‘They even built a house for me at home and looked after my family while I was a student. They were really helpful to me, and the thought that there were these sponsors caring, for me from thousands of kilometres away from here was an encouragement for me to work hard at college.
Another important function of the work of the SCF is in the field of nutrition. With the help of the Australian Government, the SCF established two nutrition rehabilitation centres for children; one at Mpemba and another in Mulanje’. The object of the Centre’s, explained Mr. Petre Chimbe, the Executive Secretary of the Fund, ‘is to combat malnutrition in children, by giving them the proper food’ .