LAGOS, Nigeria (VOICE OF NAIJA)- The Nigerian Correctional Service (NCOS) says it has no fewer than 225 inmates on death row in its facilities in Kaduna and Kano states.
The News Agency of Nigeria ((NAN) reports that its officials made this confirmation in response to a survey by the agency on the death penalty in Kaduna and Kano.
The Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) spokesperson in Kano, Musbahu Kofar-Nassarawa, disclosed in an interview that Checks in both states indicates that 150 inmates in Kano and 75 in Kaduna prisons comprising both male and female are awaiting death penalty.
He complained that Governors sometimes are reluctant to sign death warrants for death row inmates.
“We are facing challenges of prison congestion because some chief executives are not willing to sign the death warrant, resulting in some condemned inmates spending years awaiting execution,” Mr Kofar-Nassarawa added.
Shehu Abdullahi, Kano coordinator of the National Human Rights Commission (NHRC), said there was a need for relevant authorities to address the problem of condemned convicts spending years in jail.
“At times, these criminals revolt by attacking warders, even if the crime they commit demands execution,” he said.
A legal practitioner, Abdulrazaq Ahmed, said it amounted to an infringement on the rights of a condemned criminal to keep them for years without carrying out the penalty or commuting the sentence.
In Kaduna, the spokesperson for the state’s correctional service, Zaki Emmanuel, declined a request for comment.
