Two years after Nigeria recorded 15 jailbreaks across the country, the Federal Government is yet to track and recapture the over 3,828 escaped inmates roaming the country freely.
It was gathered that between October 2020 and July 5, 2022, Nigeria has recorded incessant incidences of jailbreak across 11 states with the Federal Government failing to forestall the embarrassing situation in the country.
Records have it that between 2020 to December 2021, only 984 out of the 4,369 inmates who fled from various custodial centers in the country were recaptured, thereby leaving a total of 3,385 still at large. This is in addition to the 443 yet-to-be-recaptured inmates who fled after members of Boko Haram terrorists stormed the Kuje Custodial Centre (prison) on Tuesday night, using high explosives and guns 69 of their members and 260 other inmates.
When contacted on any further information as to the additional number of recaptured escapees, the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) image-maker, Abubakar Umar, told newsmen that the Service was still documenting details of freshly captured inmates but promised to release it to the public domain once that was concluded.
Only recently, the Minister of Interior, Rauf Aregbesola, had at a media briefing organised by the Presidential Media Team at the State House in Abuja, confirmed that many recaptured inmates who escaped various custodial facilities following coordinated attacks by gunmen in many States were still on the run.
It was further gathered that these breakages have also culminated in the death of 38 persons (33 between 20-2021 and 5 in July 2022) including inmates, security operatives and some attackers, while 216 others either sustained minor or severe injuries, enough to require weeks of medical attention.
Within the period under review, 9 of these incidents were successful with a total of 5,248 inmates (4,369 between 2020-2021, and 879 in July 2022) initially escaping from their attacked facilities. The affected States include: Edo, Ondo, Lagos, Abia, Delta, Imo, Bauchi, Kano, Kogi, Oyo, Plateau, and the FCT.
Meanwhile, security experts have expressed concern that despite promising to ensure that the bio-data of all inmates were harmonised with sister agencies, the Nigeria Financial Unit, (NFIU), all banks and the INTERPOL to track all escaped inmates, no tangible result has been recorded to that effect.
