The Nigerian Correctional Services, on Thursday, explained why it allowed convicts with lesser sentences to operate from their homes.
The Controller of the Service in Enugu State, Nicholas Obiako, made the explanations to journalists shortly after decorating 92 senior officers of the Command who were promoted recently.
Obiako said the decision to offer non-custodial services to convicts with less than six-month sentences was to enable them to be reintegrated into society easily.
He also explained that non-custodial services avert room for the convicts with lesser sentences to be tagged “ex-convicts,” adding that people will not look at them as criminals.
He further said that before the Command offers non-custodial service, it collects the addresses, names, and other relevant information about the convicts so that he or she will be monitored closely.
“Non-custodian service will not make them run away because we take their addresses. It will help us to reintegrate them into the community. We have staff that supervise and monitor them, and it helps to decongest the prisons and facilitate the dispensation of justice by the courts,” he said.
On the efforts being made by his Command to avert jailbreaks, he disclosed that they have been engaging the inmates in skill acquisition programmes like carpentry and metalworking, among others, adding that when they are thus occupied, they will not be thinking of jailbreaks.
He also disclosed that the Command has been partnering with sister security agencies in the state for adequate security of the facilities of the Correctional Service and commended Governor Ifeanyi Ugwuanyi of Enugu State for the peace that reigns in the state and his support to the Command.
