Ruler laments plight of prison inmates, seeks Obasanjo’s help

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NIGERIA: FROM a royal father has come a cry of help to former President Olusegun Obasanjo.

The Olubara of Ibara, Oba Jacob Omolade, has appealed to Obasanjo to assist in the reformation of the nation’s prisons.

The monarch lamented that the nation’s prisons cannot adequately reform inmates enough to prepare them for reintegration into the community after their jail terms.

Oba Omolade, who heads a Non-Governmental Organization, Prisons Rehabilitation

and Law Abiding Organization, said as a former convict who was jailed by the late maximum ruler, Gen. Sani Abacha, on a phantom coup, the former president was better positioned to ensure reforms in the prisons.

The royal father while speaking at a conference in his Ibara, Abeokuta palace to herald the body’s public awareness on prison reformations said there was the need to do something urgently on the state of affairs in the prisons across the country.

Oba Omolade, who was a secondary school classmate of Obasanjo at Baptist Boys High School, Abeokuta, said the theme of the rally is “Prisons Reformation, Everybody’s Business.”
He said: “The purpose of confinement of people in prisons is for reformation and rehabilitation before re-integration to the larger society. Reintegration of inmates without proper reformation is detrimental to any society. We are saddened by the state of all our prisons in Nigeria to carry out reformation of inmates.”

“Most prison formations in Nigeria lack structural and human capital development of staff to carry out modern reformation of inmates,” Oba Omolade added.  “The former president, Chief Olusegun Obasanjo, is my friend.  He had recommended reformation of our prisons. I am still going to meet him and convince him to join this group.”
The traditional ruler in Egbaland, Ogun State, explained that not all those in the prisons were criminals, but some jailed for minor offences such as affray and wandering.

The ruler, who is the Chairman Board of Trustees of the organisation, flayed a development where armed robbery suspect had a close relationship with someone accused of wandering in prisons.

He stated that such relationship would lead to breeding of armed robber.

The ruler cautioned that the society and family members of ex-convicts should eschew stigmatizing them, but to embrace them.

He also said that ex-convicts should be sponsored to acquire skills like bricklaying, masonry, and carpentry, as part of efforts to reintegrate them into the society after serving jail terms.