The Minister of Interior, Dr. Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo, on Thursday visited the Suleja Medium Security Custodial Centre to carry out an on-the – spot assessment to ascertain the extent of damage done to the facility following Wednesday’s storm.
Speaking to journalists, the Minister said “there was a breach of the outer wall of the facility after the storm last night, some of the inmates escaped. We have been able to get back 10 out of the 119, we have 109 still at large. There is a manhunt presently ongoing. We will do everything humanly possible to ensure everyone of them is brought back”.
Tunji-Ojo stated that measures were being put in place to restore sanity. He assured Nigerians that his Ministry was already working behind the scene to fashion out a correctional system that will work for the benefit of Nigerians.
He expressed optimism that such an incident will not happen again in any other facility.
“This could have been avoided if the right information was disseminated at that appropriate time, on the structure. I was not appointed to make excuses. I was appointed to take responsibility and we are not shying away from taking responsibility.
“We will get them back and we will ensure this doesn’t happen again anywhere in the country.”
He further stressed the need to relocate a lot of the correctional centres to conducive environments.
“This facility was built in 1914 to house 250 inmates, before this incident we had 499, this is a testimony of what we keep talking about overcrowding of our correctional homes, you can look at the environment, it shows that we need to relocate them away from city centres to create better space, better security and better infrastructure ” he said.
The Minister was accompanied on this visit by the Controller General, Nigerian Correctional Service, Haliru Nababa, and other top management staff of the Ministry of Interior.
Ozoya Imohimi
Director (Information and Public Relations)
