Start Feeding Your Prisoners– FG Tells Each State

By Sola Omoniyi, Lagos

The federal government of Nigeria, through the Ministry of Interior, has stated that state governments would now be responsible for the feeding and accommodation of their inmates.

The minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola affirmed this in Abuja, the country’s Capital during a 2 days Conference.

According to the minister, the amendment of the 1999 constitution makes it clear that each state is now empowered to establish their own correctional services and facilities.

Any state that does not have correctional centres would have to pay Federal Government for the feeding and accommodation of their prisoners.

It could be noted that before empowering the state governments, the Nigeria Correctional centers are being run by the Federal Government, however, the criminal justice system of Nigeria have made provision for state and federal offences.

With the present law, states are now having the right to build correctional facilities to accommodate who are sentenced for committing state offences.

Presently, the federal government asserted that they spend over N22 billion to feed prisoners and access the country.

The Minister said that over 4000 inmates are in custody for being unable to pay fines of N1 million and below.