Panel finds poor feeding killing inmates due to corruption in the system
By Jeph Ajobaju, Chief Copy Editor
Many inmates in the custody of the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) are dying due to poor feeding and high level food racketeering, according to findings by a government panel.
The findings were presented at the ongoing public hearing in Abuja by Uju Agomoh, Secretary of the Independent Investigative Panel on the Alleged Corruption, Abuse of Power, Torture, Cruel, Inhumane, and Degrading Treatment of Inmates Against the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS).
She said inmates are starving because “in all of the facilities we went to during our inspection visit as a panel during the last week of February, there was no food up to the approved weekly standards by the agency.
“The stock they are supposed to have for at least seven days, as is the practice, is not being implemented.
“This is about being open to knowing where the problem is because many inmates are dying due to a lack of food.
“I have personally been going to correctional centres for more than 30 years, but I have never seen what we see these days. There have always been problems, but it has never been the way it is now.”
Agomoh explained that the panel seeks to improve efficiency in the NCoS which makes transparency critical to the panel.
She said it is dangerous to starve inmates as hunger can lead to aggression because in all the facilities the panel visited, they learnt that those supplying food to the facilities are the officers in charge, and they are failing in the task in their greed to profit from the system.
“First, the quantity that is provided is small. Second, this drive for profit-making worsens the process. The officers in charge are one of the checks and balances for the (food) contractors,” she explained.
Agomoh said the panel will need a response from the NCoS on the implementation of Section 14, Subsection 4 of the NCoS Act.
A representative of acting NCoS Controller General, Ibrahim Idris, from the legal department, disclosed that a committee has been set up at the national headquarters, known as the ‘Prison Ration Committee’, to oversee the quantity and quality of food given to inmates.
The committee members are always on duty and conducting routine checks, he stressed.
A member of the panel, Ikechukwu Ezeugo, disclosed that only a few of the more than 12 farm centres operated by the NCoS are functional.
He said the food produced by inmates at the centres is not used to feed them but is instead sold to food contractors who then resell or resupply the same to the farm centres and other custodial centres.
Ezeugo added that “the category of inmates we saw at the farm centres are not those that should be there because we saw people who are not well. Some said they have sickle cell and can’t farm, and some were underage in the farm centres.”
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