Jailbreak: Interior ministry to recruit more prison officers

The ministry of interior says it is working on recruitment and training of more personnel for the Nigerian Correctional Service to tackle the menace of jailbreaks in the country.

Aisha Rufai, secretary of the civil defence, fire, immigration and prisons services board (CDFIPB), said this on Thursday when she appeared before the house of representatives committee on interior.

In recent months, gunmen have targeted some prisons, freed inmates and killed security operatives in the process.

The latest attack happened in October when the correctional facility in Abolongo, Oyo town, was attacked by gunmen.

Speaking at the event, Rufai said the services need more funding to effectively carry out their assigned mandate.

“Outstanding recruitment for civil defence for this year is 5,000. We are hoping that we will have an increase because their mandate has been expanded to the agro rangers, that is protecting agro-allied facilities as well as the safe school initiative. So, because of that, we are hoping it would be extended to at least 10,000,” she said.

“For immigration, we are hoping that they will expand it because of the border issue.

“For the corrections, because of the jailbreaks, we already have a committee looking at the lapses and the vacuum and the need to increase the recruitment and then of course training. We are on it and we will soon make a presentation.”

Nazir Daura, chairman of the committee, said the services will be given the support needed to achieve optimal results.

“If we look at the budget and the kind of work they need to do, they have to sometimes go cap in hand to the services for them to get the funding to do what their mandate tasks them,” he said.

“So, on that note, if you peruse the budget, you will see that we do need to help them in one form or another.”