President Buhari Reforming And Decongesting Nigerian Prisons

The six new prisons will meet international standards of care, support and rehabilitation of inmates in custody. When fully functional, the facilities will address the lingering prison congestion challenges in the country, one of the officials tells #BNMCVolunteers.

President Muhammadu Buhari understands that there is a need to upgrade Nigerian prison facilities to meet international standards, in December 2017, the FG started construction of this 3,000 capacity prison at Jangoza in Kano State, today it’s almost 80% of completion.

Kano Central Prison was built in 1910 to hold just 690 inmates, but today prisoners’ population is put at about 2,000, President Muhammadu Buhari is so concerned, in July 2018, he directed AGF Abubakar Malami, SAN to fast-track the decongestion of Nigerian prisons and a stakeholders committee to that effect has since been set up.

The directive comes after the AGF had in October 2017, inaugurated an 18-man committee, chaired by the Chief Judge of the Federal Capital Territory High Court, Justice Ishaq Bello, to fast-track prisons decongestion in the country and the committee has set free 1,310 inmates that have committed minor offences with an option of fine.

The state of the prison across the country has been described as pathetic and a complete abuse of the fundamental human rights of the inmates, but with right moves by President Buhari things will be better earlier than expected.