Will FG shut down many Nigerian prisons?

By Paul Dada

The Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo has said that there is no need for the country to retain all the 256 custodial centres it currently has.

Tunji- Bello said some prison facilities only utilise  about 30 to 40 percent of their carrying capacities and  inmates with federal offences  ought to be identified with a view to redistributing them across the custodial facilities.

The minister took this position  in Abuja at the “Public Hearing on Alleged Corruption and other Violations against the Nigerian Correctional Service”, organised by the Independent Investigative Panel on the Alleged Corruption, Abuse of Power, Torture, Cruel, Inhumane and Degrading Treatment against the Nigerian Correctional Service.

He said, “Realistically speaking, do we need 256 correctional centres that we have? The answer is no because the more correctional centers, the more pressure and stress in terms of supervision and control. And when there is problem of supervision and control, abuse becomes inevitable.

“So, in so many climes today, you have 3,000 capacity correctional centres. How many do we actually need? We need to look at that.

“Number three is, even with what we have today, there are some correctional centers that are densely populated or overcrowded, let me say that.

“And there are some that are not too populated. If there are criminals, if they are federal offences, there is federal jurisdiction. If I am not wrong, federal jurisdiction is everywhere, federal high court.

“So, can we critically look and analyse every correctional centre and look at those (inmates) who have committed federal offences and move them to less populated areas? Because it will shock you that there are correctional centres with about 30%, 40% occupation rate and there are some with about 200%. So how do we look at it? We think those are short-term gains that we can do like now and be able to reduce the space,”