Overcrowding in prisons: Aregbesola calls for the release of 30% of prisoners

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Interior Minister Rauf Aregbesola said he would meet with state governors to agree the mass release of at least 30% of detainees from detention centers across the country.

Aregbesola made this known on Sunday when he appeared on the News Agency of Nigeria forum in Abuja.

The minister said the interface was necessary because more than 90% of inmates were detained for violating various state laws.

Aregbesola also said that more than 70% of the 75,635 detainees currently await trial.

The Minister said federal offenders in the system were well under 10%, adding that the bulk of those in custody were those who violated state laws.

He said they were therefore kept under the legal jurisdiction of their respective states.

The Minister added that the decongestion of the 253 detention centers nationwide was necessary because some detainees have no reason to remain in detention.

Aregbesola therefore said that all stakeholders must work for a "better structured administration of criminal justice, otherwise we will end up with cluttered and overcrowded facilities".

He said: "I have written to the Nigerian Governors Forum to allow me to come and speak to them on how they can support the decongestion process.

"Because governors need to buy into this system for us to decongest massively, especially of detainees awaiting trial.

"If we get buy-in from the state judiciary and the state government, we can remove 30% of those who are there."

According to him, some of the detainees awaiting trial have remained longer than the sentence provided by law for the crime for which they were arrested.

"If you look at a man who is arrested for petty larceny and you try him for three years, even if you convict him of this crime, how long will he stay?

"How long will this man stay, probably six months, but without a trial, he will stay there for three years.

“Once again you have arrested a boy under the bridge, there is no fixed crime and he is there forever and so on.

“So we need buy-in and support from state governments.

"It's for them to know the situation critically and let them set up committees that will profile everyone who is there.

“And help either convict them, or release them, or see if they have overstayed,” the minister said.

Aregbesola assured that the Ministry of the Interior is doing everything in its power to decongest the detention centers.

He said the meeting with the governors would help critically examine the situation and relieve the system of inmates who should have been released.

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