Four correctional centres in Akwa Ibom State are overstretched in facilities due to the large number of inmates awaiting trial.
Currently, the centres with a capacity for 1,336 inmates are occupied by 2,559.
A breakdown shows that Uyo correctional centre has capacity for 613 inmates but currently accommodating 1,282; Ikot Ekpene centre has 400 capacity but accommodates 756 inmates; Eket centre has 123 capacity but now holds 365 inmates, while Ikot Abasi centre has 200 capacity but has 156 inmates.
Briefing the press on the 1st Inmates’ Rehabilitation Concert Unity For Success Security Week 2019, the State Controller of the Service, Mr Alex Oditah, said 41 inmates, comprising 39 males and two females are on the death row.
Speaking on theme: with the theme: ‘Effective Leadership: A Recipe for Peace, Security and National Development’, Oditah explained that some of the inmates who have passed through their custodial centres have truly been rehabilitated, but many who were released have become hardened because of rejection from the society and their families.
“When 70% of the inmates are awaiting trial, it becomes difficult for us to engage them in any particular skill because their date of discharge is not known.
“If an inmate who is in our facility awaiting trial is sent to the tailoring section, and the tailoring section is supposed to carry out tutelage for about three years, and by the time the person spends two months, he is let go, it defeats the very purpose of rehabilitation.
“But for those whose date of discharge are known, it becomes very easy. If someone has three years imprisonment, you know the actual section to send him to, either tailoring or shoe making. It is very difficult to send an awaiting trial to any particular skill centre because his date of discharge is obviously not known. These are the very serious challenges in rehabilitating and reforming some of the inmates.
“It is believed that people who go to prison become more hardened. For us, we don’t believe it is supposed to be so, but why is it so? It is because those of them who pass through our institution and have acquired skill and are sent to the larger society, we first reject them, the society rejects them and even their families reject them.
There are people out there who are ready to accept them, so we are appealing to the public to know that some of them who have passed through our institution are truly rehabilitated, and they have a job,” he stated.
The controller said they were hopeful that when the 2019 Act of the Correctional Service is approved and becomes law, many of the challenges of the agency, especially the problem of congestion in their facilities would be solved.
He, however, lamented that the Correctional Service was the least celebrated among security agencies in the country, and hoped the situation would change.
