The minister should, according to the senior attorney, ask President Bola Tinubu and the governors of the several states to pardon the 4,000 offenders.
Femi Falana, a human rights attorney and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), has requested that Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, the interior minister, reconsider his plan for collecting the N500 million in penalties levied on at least 4,000 offenders by various courts.
In his capacity as the Chairman of the Alliance on Surviving COvid 19 and Beyond (ASCAB), Falana announced this in a statement on Sunday.
The minister recently unveiled a strategy to decongest the country’s prisons by securing the payment of the fines imposed on at least 4,000 inmates by various courts in the 36 states of the Federation and the Federal Capital Territory in an interview that was not shown on Channels Television.
The 500 million N total fines would be paid within the following four weeks, according to Tunji-Ojo.
Falana, however, stated that while the Interior Minister deserves praise for the initiative, a reassessment of the strategy is necessary.
“While alternative decongestion policies are taken into consideration, the N500 million designated for the payment of fines should be spent on the welfare of inmates in the correctional centres.”
The senior attorney advised the minister to ask President Bola Tinubu and the governors of the several states to exercise their right to mercy by pardoning the 4,000 offenders in order to ensure their immediate release from custody.
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Falana remembered that during the COVID-19 outbreak, the administration of former President Muhammadu Buhari had freed 7,813 detainees from the Nigeria Correctional Centres distributed throughout the nation in order to stop the virus’s transmission among inmates.
The Minister may also want to ask the Chief Justice of Nigeria, the Chief Judges of each State, and the Chief Judge of the Federal Capital Territory to visit the prisons and use their authority under the Criminal Justice (Release from Custody) (Special Provisions) Act to order the release of all prisoners whose detention is either clearly unlawful or who have been in custody for periods longer than the maximum period of imprisonment
But it is important to call the Interior Minister’s attention to the situation of the numerous prisoners who are incarcerated in the Ikoyi Correctional Centre because their case records were destroyed when the Magistrate Court and High Court buildings were set on fire during the #EndSARS protests in October 2020. We implore the Interior Minister to ensure that these prisoners are released right away because the State can no longer prosecute them because their cases have been burned as the country observes the third anniversary of the #EndSARS protests.
