The Federal Government on Wednesday revealed that 93 per cent of inmates in correctional centres across Nigeria are state offenders, while only seven per cent are being held for federal offences.
This revealed that many of those in custody were incarcerated for minor offences that did not warrant imprisonment.
Minister of Interior, Dr Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, made the disclosure at the Regional Conference on the Classification of Prisoners and the Use of Technology in Prisons in Africa, jointly organised by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the African Correctional Services Association (ACSA) in Abuja.
According to the minister, the Tinubu administration has taken deliberate steps to decongest custodial centres by reviewing the cases of inmates jailed for minor offences.
“93 per cent of our inmates in Nigeria are state offenders. Only seven per cent are federal offenders. And of this 93 per cent, before this President came on board, a lot of them were in custody for minor offences that had no need for incarceration,” he said.
Tunji-Ojo recalled that shortly after assuming office, he directed the Nigerian Correctional Service to compile records of inmates imprisoned for unpaid fines and compensation of less than ₦500,000.
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“When I became minister, I called my Permanent Secretary and the Controller-General of the Correctional Service and asked them to provide the records of people in correctional centres over fines and compensation of less than ₦500,000. We discovered there were over 4,000 such inmates,” he said.
According to him, the fines were paid to free over 4,000 inmates as part of an initiative to decongest correctional centres across the country.
Describing the situation as economically unsustainable, the minister said the government was spending far more to feed the inmates than the value of the fines for which they were imprisoned.
“I said, what is the sense in this? We feed them in one year with more than 10 times the amount of the fine. How is the government benefiting? We cleared the cases, and in one day we decongested our correctional centres by five per cent,” he stated.
He urged correctional authorities across Africa to reassess the causes of prison overcrowding, arguing that many inmates across the continent are serving custodial sentences for offences that could be handled through alternative sanctions.
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“The question is this: Is your correctional centre rightfully overcrowded? When you look at the offences, you will realise that 30, 40 or even 50 per cent of inmates are there for offences that do not warrant incarceration,” he said.
The minister also announced a significant reduction in recidivism, saying the number of repeat offenders in Nigeria’s correctional facilities had dropped from about 13,000 cases in 2023 to about 1,000 last year.
He attributed the improvement to expanded educational opportunities and vocational training programmes introduced for inmates.
According to him, 62 inmates are currently pursuing postgraduate studies, 261 are enrolled in undergraduate programmes, while 1,125 are receiving formal education within correctional facilities.
He added that the Nigerian Correctional Service now operates 18 study centres of the National Open University of Nigeria (NOUN) inside custodial centres, while 9,582 inmates are participating in vocational and non-formal education programmes aimed at rehabilitation and reintegration.
Tunji-Ojo further disclosed that Nigeria has not recorded any jailbreak or attack on a correctional facility in the last three years, attributing the achievement to improved technology, biometric systems and enhanced collaboration among security agencies.
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He cited the case of an escaped inmate who was rearrested after attempting to obtain a Nigerian passport.
“Immediately, he placed his finger at the Nigeria Immigration Service to process a passport; the system identified him as an inmate. Immigration immediately alerted the Correctional Service, and he was arrested on the spot,” he said.
Earlier, the Controller-General of the Nigerian Correctional Service, Sylvester Ndidi Nwakuche, said the country’s correctional system had continued to evolve under the Nigerian Correctional Service Act, 2019.
He described prisoner classification as a critical component of modern correctional administration, noting that it helps identify inmates’ risk levels, protect vulnerable prisoners, improve resource allocation and deliver effective rehabilitation programmes.
Nwakuche also emphasised the importance of technology in strengthening correctional administration through better record management, information sharing and institutional accountability.
