Legal Imperatives for Decongesting Correctional Centres in Nigeria: A Review of Recent Legislative Measures

Abstract

One of the major drawbacks in the Nigerian criminal justice system is the congestions in correctional centres. Custodial centres are not only the pivot on which the wheel of criminal justice revolves. They are also institutions which provide homes for a technical segment of the society and protection for the general public. Having regard to modern objectives of correctional services, it has become more paramount for custodial or correctional centres to indeed provide platform not only for housing inmates but more importantly as an opportunity to rehabilitate, remould and make lives of inmates more useful whether during custody or after their release. Unfortunately, these objectives are very difficult to realize in Nigeria as a result of several factors accounting for the congestion of Nigerian prisons. It was in the light of this that certain critical legislations were enacted i.e. the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, the Police Act 2020, and the Nigerian Correctional Service Act, 2019 to deliberately arrest some of the major factors which are responsible for why custodial centres have always been overstretched beyond official capacity. Though the ACJA and others were overwhelmingly received with approval by all, it is observed that there is gross lack of will on the part of the government and other stakeholders in the criminal justice sector to fully adhere to and implement the provisions of the laws. The government is urged to increase efforts in empowering relevant and critical stakeholders like the police, the courts and the correctional centres in implementing the laudable objectives of the ACJA and other relevant legislations for a purposeful criminal justice delivery.