Zarephath Aid, a non-governmental organization, has called for immediate and decisive action to address the alarming rise in pre-trial inmates in Nigeria’s correctional facilities.
Speaking during a press briefing to mark Human Rights Day, the organization’s founder, Ben Abraham, highlighted the urgent need for systemic reforms to protect the rights of detainees languishing in custody without trial.
The briefing, held on a day dedicated by the United Nations to the celebration of human rights globally, marked 76 years since the adoption of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) in 1948. Abraham emphasized that human rights are an intrinsic part of human existence and that violations of these rights, such as delays in trial, diminish the essence of life.
“It is unacceptable that about 80% of the inmate population in our correctional facilities consists of pre-trial detainees,” Abraham stated. He outlined various challenges contributing to the crisis, including the absence of prosecution witnesses, lack of transportation for inmates to court, administrative delays, and the non-transmission of case files to relevant authorities.
Zarephath Aid noted the plight of detainees who have spent up to 10 years or more awaiting trial due to systemic failures. Among them were Moses Abiodun and Kazeem Adeshina, recently released after spending 16 years in custody at the Medium Correctional Centre, Kinkin.
Their cases had been stalled because of the police’s failure to act on directives to transfer their case files to the appropriate jurisdiction.
Another case involved an inmate whose charges were struck out by the courts, yet he was abandoned in custody for over a year before Zarephath Aid’s intervention. “We cannot be celebrating human rights while such grave injustices persist in our correctional centres,” Abraham asserted.
To address these issues, Zarephath Aid proposed that there is need for audit of correctional facilities. The Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committees (ACJMC) at the federal and state levels should collaborate with NGOs to audit all correctional facilities and identify inmates’ cases.
They also called for special legal panels which will be headed by retired judges and magistrates should be employed on an ad-hoc basis to expedite legal advice and clear the backlog of cases awaiting trial.
The organization also urged that Federal and state governments should collaborate with NGOs to decongest correctional centres, replicating initiatives from past administrations, such as that of President Olusegun Obasanjo.
Ben Abraham further called for immediate action,saying that : “right delayed is a right denied.”
