A Helping Hand For Nigerian Prisons, Inmates

It was one day that hell called at the Kirikiri Prisons in Lagos. Well, it isn’t that hell has ever been too far away from the penitentiary, going by the distressing reports daily emanating from one of Nigeria’s largest correctional facilities.
But on Friday, October 10, the inmates’ wrath boiled over. They staged an impulsive protest, with some allegedly attempting a jailbreak. A number of prisoners were reportedly shot at, and many were they that sustained varying degrees of injury.
It wasn’t the first time that prison inmates would be protesting in Nigeria. On several occasions, those held in such facilities have demonstrated over the rot in the system. From Kirikiri to Kuje, from Adamawa to Ado-Ekiti, the nation’s 227 prisons easily cut the pathetic picture of total decay, with many decrying the hellish condition of the inmates that are usually packed like sardines in overcrowded, hardly hygienic cells.
But the situation isn’t totally hopeless. One group that has stood out in consistently offering a helping hand to the prisons and their inmates is the Prisoners’ Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA), a human rights organisation fighting for the total reforms of the country’s decaying prison system.
In the past 20 years, PRAWA has been doing a yeoman’s job in providing psychological rehabilitation and medical intervention to prison inmates as well as victims of torture. Since its birth on November 5, 1994, PRAWA has been crisscrossing Nigeria and many other African countries, preaching the gospel of prison reforms and waging an all-out war against torture and other human rights abuses.
“In light of the prevalence of torture committed in prisons and in the course of police interrogations, we also carry out capacity building of healthcare departments in prisons, police officers and members of academia on the prevention and documentation of torture,” PRAWA’s Executive Director, Dr. Uju Agomoh informed.
PRAWA, it was gathered, is a non-governmental organisation whose major aim is the promotion of security, justice and development in Africa. The organisation, in 1998, secured an observer status with the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights. PRAWA has three major programme components. They include Security and Justice Sector Reform Programme Component, Social Development and Rehabilitation Programme Component and Research and Documentation Programme Component. The group utilises some strategies to ensure a successful implementation of its programmes. The strategies are Training and Capacity Building (TRACAD); Research and Advocacy; Human Rights Monitoring Rehabilitation, Care and Support Services (RECASS), and Community Justice Programme and Engagement (COJUP).
The organisation, in 2010, commenced the Prisons Reform Interventions in Africa (PRIA) Project in a number of African countries, in partnership with the African Commission on Human and People’s Rights (ACHPR), the African Correctional Services Association (ACSA), the International Corrections and Prison Association (ICPA) and the Prisons/Correctional Services in the benefiting countries. The ambitious three-year project, which was supported by the Dutch government, was piloted in Nigeria, Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Zambia and Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). It was a commendable project that promoted effective and sustainable prison reforms in Africa, with the ultimate objective of making African prisons comply with international human rights standards and improve the human rights conditions of the prisons and their inmates.
Besides the PRIA project, PRAWA has also saddled itself with other important responsibilities, including the Human Rights Training Integration (HRTI), designed to improve the awareness and observance of international human rights principle and good prison practices in Nigeria; the Illegal Migration Awareness Project (IMAP), under which the organisation seeks to increase the awareness of Nigerian youths on the effects of illegal migration and positive life planning skills; the Justice For All (J4A), which has been working hard to speed up criminal justice in Enugu State, and the OAK Project, which battles the practice of torture.
PRAWA will turn 20 on Wednesday, November 5. On that day, the organisation will invite the world to Abuja, the nation’s capital. Some eminent personalities will attempt to dissect the theme of the event – Transforming Public Safety and Security in Nigeria: An Integrated Vision for the Criminal Justice Sector. Among the speakers are the Chairman, National Human Rights Commission of Nigeria, Dr. Chidi Odinkalu, and the Executive Director, International Association for Correctional and Forensic Psychology, USA, Dr. John Gannon.
The organisation said of the event: “This event is quite important because it does not only provide an opportunity for the organisation to review its activities; it also presents a platform for it to kick off its plans for the future. The organisation understands that any reform worth having must be comprehensive and sustainable. Hence, in the coming years, PRAWA hopes to consolidate its work in meaningful ways by becoming: a reference point for social development intervention for crime prevention in Africa; a champion in building a critical mass of personnel and institutions in community corrections; and a leading resource centre for sustainable, social entrepreneurship research and social development models for both rehabilitative and crime prevention purposes targeted at youths, prisoners, ex-prisoners, and victims of torture.”
Other activities at the event include the launch of an Endowment Fund for PRAWA youths at risk projects, and the Public Perception Survey Report on the Nigeria Criminal Justice System, described as an action plan for an integrated approach to security and justice sector reform, among others.
Dr. Agomoh said the group’s works over the past 20 years have continued to raise certain posers within the sector. She wondered, for instance, why awaiting trial inmates have continued to account for more than 80 percent of the total inmate population in Nigeria, and why between 80 and about 90 percent of the total inmate population are youths. She was uncomfortable that about two-thirds of ex-prisoners always commit fresh offences, which, according to her, indicates that the country’s approach to processing offender is highly dubious.  She expressed regrets that torture was yet to be totally eradicated from within the system.
But PRAWA has also recorded a number of landmark achievements, she stated. For instance, unlike in the past when NGOs were hardly allowed in the prison sector, even government agencies now partner with such organisations. She informed that PRAWA has visited more than 150 prisons and intervened in over 39 countries. The organisation has also grown from a two-staff group to one that employs over 30. PRAWA even has a designated desk at the office of the Special Rapporteur on Prisons and Places of Detention, the first NGO to achieve such a feat.
In spite of PRAWA’s efforts, the organisation can hardly afford to seek repose. A prison audit report released in 2012 is hardly encouraging. Besides the presence of many mentally-challenged persons in virtually all the prisons in the country, the sanitary condition of the cells will even make a swine recoil in utmost disgust.
The report partly reads: “Though there is every effort by the inmates to keep the cells clean and tidy, the age of the infrastructure (some of these prisons were built in 1925) and overcrowding in some cells frustrated the effort. In most of the prisons, the water cistern toilets were broken and there was no water to flush after use in some instances. In some, they used the bucket system and that created a lot of stench in the cells. In some other instance where there exists sewage system, the sewage systems were either broken or filled up. The prisons also lacked basic toiletries like soap or disinfectants.
“The standard of facilities in the Nigerian prisons are appalling, to say the least. Most of the prisons audited lacked facilities that would aid the wellbeing of the inmates as well as the reintegration of inmates back in the society after their release from prison.”
But Dr. Uju Agomoh said her organisation was poised work even harder now that the organisation is 20.
The PRAWA director encouraged victims of torture to avail themselves of the opportunities offered by the Economic Community of West African States (ECOWAS) Court of Justice.
Said she: “It is very important for victims to be able to make themselves heard beyond their own legal system, as otherwise they may not have a remedy, for instance, in cases that are indefinitely delayed. The ECOWAS Court of Justice can provide an alternative forum for torture victims in Nigeria and elsewhere in the sub-region. It may also be easier for victims, especially female victims, to file a case against the State outside Nigeria because of the fear of reprisals by law enforcement agents and the absence of witness protection mechanisms in Nigeria.
“But not many victims in Nigeria know that the court exists, and lawyers are often not trained in seeking a remedy from the court either. Most legal representatives in Nigeria are not aware of the five different forms of reparation that can be requested when submitting a case on behalf of a torture victim to the court.
“It is important for lawyers and others, assisting torture victims to know that the court only decides on what the parties request. If the legal representative fails to request a specific form of reparation, such as rehabilitation, the court will not award such reparation, even if it finds a state responsible for torture. This is a somewhat limited approach that fails to take into account the rights of victims to reparation under international law.”
 Report by Tope Adeboboye for The Sun