GOV SOLUDO PROMISES CUSTODIAL CENTER INMATES OF SPEEDY JUSTICE DELIVERY
REPORTER: ONYINYE CHIJIOBI
Anambra State Government has promised to provide necessary facilities that will improve the living condition of inmates custodial centres (prisons) in the area.
Governor Chukwuma Soludo made this known when he visited the Nigeria Correctional Centre, Ekwulobia in Aguata Local Government Area.
Professor Soludo said he would direct whoever that would be his Commissioner for Justice to immediately review their cases and ensure speedy dispensation of justice.
Correctional facility or remand center, is a facility in which inmates are confined to serve jail terms for various offences committed.
However those on awaiting trial seem to overwhelm the facilities as their number surpasses the convicted ones.
Governor Soludo, who expressed dismay with the condition of the facility after a tour, promised to renovate the facility within the shortest possible time.
Professor soludo also promised to transform the condition of the inmates, assuring them that they were not forgotten.
He also assured the inmates that his administration would ensure speedy adjudication of their cases.
The Governor expressed regret that some inmates had been on awaiting trial for over fifteen years.
He pledged to provide recreational facilities, solar powered ICT center and other facilities that would channel their interest into productivity.
For the Controller Nigeria Correctional Service, Anambra State, Mr. Patrick Chukwuemeka, the Governor’s visit to the Aguata facility was a moral booster, maintaining that mandate of the agency was to transform lives.
He pledged the agency’s zeal to partner state government for better development of the state and pleaded for a better enabling environment to help the inmates become responsible and successful persons in the state.
One of the inmates, who gave responded on behalf of others, stressed the need to look into their welfare as well as grant some pardon, alleging that some of them on awaiting trial had not been to the court for three years.
The Aguata custodial facility has one hundred and seventy six (176) inmates.