June 7, 2024

The Federal Government says it will initiate processes to possibly relocate Ikoyi prison and some of other correctional centres from urban centres in the country.

Minister of Interior, Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, stated this on Channels Television’s Politics Today programme on Thursday.

What is a correctional centre doing in Ikoyi? This administration is looking at possibly relocating these correctional centres.

The minister said urbanisation has eaten into the setbacks that ought to be around correctional centres in the country.

Tunji-Ojo said, “Under this administration, we’ve not had any jail attack; what we’ve had was force majeure which was Suleja because that particular correctional centre was built in 1914. It’s about 110 years old.

“President Tinubu was not President a 110 years ago. He inherited 256 correctional centres that needed attention. There is no way he would have completely overhauled it in one year.

“I must talk about urbanisation. Look at Suleja for example, the Suleja correctional centre that came down was only 7 metres away from the next house.

Instead of what the law says which is a buffer space of 100 metres. So, urbanisation has eaten deep.

“Look at Ikoyi Correctional Centre sharing a fence with (another house). What’s (a) correctional centre doing in Ikoyi? This administration is looking at being able to initiate the process of possibly relocating some of these correctional centres.”

He said the government would soon commence “inmate audit” across the 256 correctional centres in the country and sanitise them by freeing those who don’t have any business being there in the first instance.

Tunji-Ojo said President Bola Tinubu inherited so many old correctional centres that need attention but the government has started the renovation and rebuilding of some of the prisons in Nigeria.

“We’ve renovated over 10 correctional centres under this administration,” he said, adding that the government has done “magic in the Kuje correctional centre”.

The Ikoyi prison, built in 1955, is located in the highbrow Ikoyi area on the Lagos Island. In October 2020, in the heat of the #EndSARS protest against police brutality and its attendant ripple effect, inmates tried to take advantage of the tension in the country at the time but security agents foiled the attempted jailbreak at the prison.

A number of jailbreaks have been recorded in the country in the last few years, with scores of inmates at large.