Interior Minister: Each inmate costs FG N1m per year

The Federal Government of Nigeria has announced that it spends N1 million annually on each inmate at

correctional facilities across the country. This was revealed by Sola Fasure, the Media Adviser to the Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, in a statement made on Saturday in Abuja.

 

The minister made this disclosure while inaugurating a 20-bed COVID-19 Crisis Intervention Fund Hospital and Equipment at the Maximum Security Custodial Centre in Port Harcourt. Aregbesola said that the project would be an enduring legacy and a testimony to the utmost importance that the Federal Government had placed on the welfare of inmates and staff, as well as corrections.

 

He added that the current administration led by President Muhammadu Buhari had made significant progress in addressing the problem of inmates contracting diseases in custodial centres. Aregbesola pointed out that these centres were once frightening hubs for diseases like scabies and tuberculosis, among others, but that the government had tackled the issue, and such diseases were now a thing of the past.

 

The minister lamented the enormous challenges involved in running correctional services, with demands for infrastructure, equipment and the maintenance of inmate welfare. However, he assured the public that the Federal Government had provided long-term solutions to these challenges.

 

He noted that the Port Harcourt custodial centre, which has a capacity for 1,800 inmates, currently housed about 3,067 inmates. This overpopulation was also a reflection of the situation in most urban custodial centres in Nigeria, which are congested.

 

Aregbesola explained that the facilities and personnel are overstretched, but the government was coping and providing long-term solutions to these challenges. One of these solutions is the construction of mega 3,000-capacity custodial villages in six geo-political zones of the country. The one for the South-South is located in Bori, Rivers State, not far from the Port Harcourt custodial centre. The ones for the North-West in Janguza, Kano and the North-Central in Karshi, Abuja, are ready for inauguration.

 

The minister also reiterated that the Federal Government would stop feeding inmates incarcerated for breaching state laws, and he urged state governments to include feeding their inmates in their budget process for next year.

 

Aregbesola expressed his confidence that the new hospital would go a long way in addressing the medical concerns of inmates and correctional service personnel. He commended the management and staff of the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) for their hard work in keeping the virus away. The minister said that the new hospital was an intervention aimed at providing robust healthcare for those in custody and NCoS staff.

 

He added that the interventions in consonance with other reforms in the NCoS would undoubtedly translate to security, peace, and tranquillity in and around the centres, and ultimately, the entire country.