No fewer than 3,145 inmates are on death row in custodial centres across Nigeria.
TheNewsGuru.com, (TNG) reports spokesman to the Nigerian Correctional Service, Umar Abubakar, in a response to enquiry by newsmen on the numbers of inmates awaiting execution at the various correctional center across the country said there were 3,084 males and 61 females on death row.
Some lawyers and human rights activists have consistently expressed concerns over the fate of the inmates, as most state governors refuse to sign the death warrant, leading to the rising number of inmates on death row.
Some of them have suggested the conversion of the death sentence to life imprisonment, while some argued that if government wasn’t willing to sign the warrant, capital punishment should be expunged from the constitution as well as other relevant laws
Meanwhile, despite complaints by several stakeholders, including lawyers and authorities of the NCoS, over the congestion of the facilities, the number of inmates in the custodial centres have continued to rise, fuelling congestion and making management of the centres difficult.
Figures on the website of the NCoS indicated that as of July 4, there were a total of 74,675 inmates in the country’s correctional centers comprising 52,714 awaiting trial and 21,961 convicted inmates with the number of male inmates given as 73,139 while female inmates accounts for 1,536