The Federal Government is seeking a waiver for inmates across the nations’s correctional facilities with fines less than N1 million.
The minister while commissioning a 20-bed space medical facility at the Port Harcourt custodial centre asked governors to grant waivers to inmates in that situation.
“Last year, we requested for details of persons with fines or such financial orders of less than N1,000,000 that are still in our facilities and we got about five million,
“In January, I wrote specifically to all governors to sensitise them on the need to waive these fines so as to take those Nigerians away from the custodial centres,” he said.
In 2021, lawmakers had approved the increase of inmate’s daily allowance from N450 per person to a minimum of N1000 per day, based on the nation’s economic situation.
In 2022, the correctional service authorities decried the pressure of maintaining its facilities across the country due to the increase of inmates in its custody.
Its leadership disclosed in the same year that nearly 75 per cent of inmates were awaiting trial.