John Adoyi, PBA Journalism MenteeArticles, lectures, debates and all manner of analysis have been done on Nigeria’s spiraling insecurity. Like a stage-four cancer, it is getting worse.
The latest in the trend of insecurity, is prison attacks, the most stunning being that of the Medium Security Prison Kuje in Abuja, the seat of power.
Criminals have made it a date with correctional facilities where their members are being held. Kuje Prison fell like a pack of cards when the attackers struck, giving them the joy of ‘mission accomplished.’
President of the Senate, Ahmad Lawan, who led a delegation of the upper chamber to assess the situation told officials of the correctional centre that the incident was as a result of security failure. He said: “The attack on this correctional facility is symptomatic of the failure of security architecture. The attack is only a culmination of the failure of security systems.”
Then he dropped a bomb shell saying,
“Having gone round the facility itself, we are disappointed that this facility does not have Closed Circuit Television cameras, something that would record and give you details of what is happening and sometimes record the events.
“This is a medium security custodial center, how on earth in the FCT facility of this magnitude we don’t have CCTV? It means we can say that all other medium security centers across the country do not have CCTV.”
In 2019, President Mohammadu Buhari signed into law the Nigerian Correctional Service Act.
The bill supposedly, was a fresh air away from the Nigerian Prison Service that was corrupt, non-functional and a breeding ground for criminal groups and their rivals.
It came with a lot of reforms which included reducing overcrowding in the facilities. The opportunity for inmates to engage meaningfully in skill acquisition and revamping of the entire prison system.
Years down the line, this Act has not achieved one of its core objectives of securing the correctional centres to prevent prison breaks.
According to media analysis, there were 15 prison break attempts and 5,000 escapes between 2020-2021 in which eight were successful.
In April 2021, one of the high profile jail breaks took place at the Owerri Correctional Centre where 1,000 inmates were released. We have other ones that took place at the Benin Correctional Centre, Jos, Kabba in Kogi State, and others
This and many more attacks have taken place at correctional centres and it seems that from one attack to another, nothing is being done.
While fielding questions from journalists, Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aragbesola said: “The security situation of every space, community, society or nation reflects on all aspects of that society. So, whatever we are witnessing is a fallout of challenges we are having nationally. As for specific causes, it’s not specific. It’s a little bit varied and diverse. Yes, attacks could be for specific causes in the centres or simply to harass the government.”
This shows that the government cannot even point to a specific loophole that is making these attacks fertile.
It is quite appalling and unimaginable that a correctional centre of such size in the political capital of the country lacks CCTV cameras.
How would they know what inmates are up to? How would the top officers know what their subordinates are doing concerning the inmates? Is this not a free ticket to full blown corruption that perhaps, involves illicit drugs and acrimony?
These attackers seem to understand the loopholes in Nigerian prisons’ and they use it to their full advantage.
Nigerians are tired of hearing the government investigating issues and not producing any result.
It is over days now since the Kuje Prison break and nothing officially concrete has been heard from expected sources.
The president of the Senate asked controllers of correctional centres nationwide to include CCTV camera provision in their 2023 budgets. But why can’t the government, as a matter of urgency, provide CCTV cameras for all correctional centres right now; must Nigeria wait until the next budget in 2023, an election year?
Indeed, he echoed the concern of all Nigerians when he said: “Now, as this facility lacks a functional CCTV, there’s no record of what happened, except narration. But if we had CCTV, at least the records would have been there and analysis made, and arrest will be based on the information from the CCTV.”
The security personnel of the prison need to be more equipped to deal with attackers and not be over powered as we have seen over again.
READ ALSO: Despite Earlier Warning, Hoodlums Launch Attack At Kuje Correctional Centre
The ministry of interior said they have captured the biometric information of all inmates in the facilities of NCOS, working in partnership with the Nigerian Identity Management Commission (NIMC).
Prisons need decongestion so that inmates will not be too many for the officials and security personnel to manage.
The Ministry of Interior, authorities of correctional centres, members of the Nigerian defense need to do more than “investigations” to curb this menace. Action that yield fruits speaks louder than promises.
If sinners can find a loophole from hell to heaven, what then is the usefulness of the commandment and praise and worship?
John Adoyi is a Prime Business Africa Journalism Mentee
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