The Federal Government has begun teaching practical skills to empower prisoners in Nigeria’s 241 correctional facilities and prepare them for life after being in prison.
This information was revealed at a press briefing in Abuja on Wednesday by the Senior Special Adviser to the President on Technical, Vocational and Entrepreneurship Education, Abiola Arogundade.
Arogundade, who mentioned that President Bola Tinubu is worried about reintegrating the prisoners into society, also stated that each participant will receive N500,000 once they finish the skills training program.
The Nigerian Correctional Service includes 241 custodial facilities, 85 satellite custodial centres, 15 farm centres, two custodial open camps, four institutions, seven training schools, and non-custodial services across the country.
However, the presidential aide insisted that only 500 inmates from each facility will be considered after the official start of the trial program in Kuje Centre, which currently has a capacity of 723 inmates.
She remarked, 'We launched the program in Kuje after assessing the needs of the inmates. Every person we train there will also be certified. We are collaborating with international organizations to ensure that any skill you acquire in Nigeria will be acknowledged globally.'
“Upon completion of their prison term and our training, we give them N500,000 to establish their business so they don’t become repeat offenders after leaving the correctional facility. This program is ongoing.
“After Kuje Correctional Centre, we are moving to Suleja. We are going to attempt to replicate this intervention in all our correctional facilities. We are also partnering with the Bank of Industry. For instance, we will train the recipients on how to have the best skills in hairdressing in a kiosk they can also use for POS and other business ventures.
“We are collaborating with banks. They will provide the POS in a place where people can also come in to charge phones. We are using that as a multi-purpose intervention for three streams of income after we train and certify them.
“In the correctional center in Kuje, they have already started activities such as fashion designs with modern equipment. We are going to donate more up-to-date sewing machines. They complained a lot about computers so we will be donating laptops. We have different modules for training. Some are for six months of training while others are for nine months.”
Arogundade also listed some of the available vocational skills as fashion design, computer training, hairdressing, fish farming, soap making, and poultry business.
While emphasizing that the targets are those who have a few months left on their sentences, she revealed that the program was modeled after a similar initiative that is running successfully in Norwegian prisons.
“Our goal is to start with people closer to the end of their sentence so that as you regain your freedom, you leave with the skills and the N500,000 grant. We have looked at some case studies in other countries, like the Norwegian prisons to see what they did because they have a very low second time offenders rate. So we have been working with that very closely.
“Even though there are 723 prisoners in Kuje, we aim to educate at least 500. We don't want to force them because the President wants to include everyone and doesn't support compulsory military-like training. We talked to them and gave them questionnaires to find out who wants to participate in the training,” she explained.