About 70% Of Prison Inmates Are Suspects – Commission

About 70 per cent of prison inmates
languishing in the country’s prisons were suspects awaiting trials. This was
disclosed by the Director of the Commission, Alhaji Nasiru Ladan, in an
interview with reporters at a one day sensitization meeting with ministries,
departments and agencies held in Sokoto yesterday.

Alhaji Nasiru said as part of the
commission’s effort to ensure justice is dispensed to all, the commission
would, through its Prison Audit Programme, intervene to seek redress on the
injustice done to some accused persons because, according to him, cases abound
where an accused standing trial spend more than what he is supposed to serve
even if convicted.

Speaking earlier, the Executive
Secretary of the commission, Professor Bem Angwe, said the commission will
continue to partner with the media, non-governmental and developmental
organizations to create awareness on human right issues at community level.

Professor Angwe added that as part of
the effort to reach out to rural populace where human right abuses are more
prevalent, his commission has established 13 additional offices in the 13
states of the federation and more would be established to cover the whole
country.

He said the new offices would ensure
continuous awareness creation on human rights issues as well as put in place
adequate complaints treatment mechanism to support victims of human right
violations.

He added that under the new act as
amended, the commission is now empowered to investigate complaints of human
right violations, compel the witness to appear before it, and enforce her
decisions through the High Court, among others.