Emeka Ibemere
A high drug ring existing
inside Kirikiri Maximum prison has been bust.
The deal got punctured when
an agent who smuggle the illicit ‘wares’ for inmates-drug traffickers and
barons in a business deal was picked up by prison officials at the entrance
gate of the prison and transferred the agent to the authority in charge of drug
control and reduction.
Investigations show that the prison walls are
not a boundary anymore and that drug barons have infiltrated prisons to courier
drugs for money. There was a report that inside drug trading goes on daily
basis in prisons.
Majority of inmates in
Kirikiri prisons are drug traffickers and barons serving different jail terms.
Most of the drug incidents
seizures are mainly marijuana, heroin and cocaine. There are cases of inmates
in the prisons who develop mental illness due to drug abuse.
Checks also revealed that
drugs reach inmates in numerous ways through visiting relatives, through the
complicity of prison staff and by inmates who smuggle in drugs dropped off by
associates at off-prison work sites.
Social workers who go to
prisons disclosed that much of the prison drug trade is controlled by gangs and
the attraction is the huge price sale of the drugs. The current price for
cannabis behind bars in Nigerian prisons is sometimes 30% times the street
value.
Who controls the
gang-related drug activities in Prisons, sometimes led to prison violence and
death.
It was gathered that most
of the jail-breaks or riots caused by different gangs are not necessarily
because the inmates are not well fed or taking care of but because of a drug
deal gone bad. Some inmates are said to involve in narcotics deal.
Inmates obtain their drugs
by adopting a smuggling tactics at which drugs passed from a visiting wife or
girlfriend through a seemingly food.
Drugs are secreted in soup,
stew, garri or other solid foods which are supposed to be exempt from thorough
searches in prison reception or waiting rooms.
Mitchell Ofoyeju NDLEA
Spokesman said that the anti-drug efforts have been effective inside the
prisons. According to him, there was zero illicit trading in prisons
Police cells haven’t been spared from the drug
blight. It’s a common practice in every prison and police cells with inmates
drug use and drug smuggling in almost every prison establishment.
Nigerian prisons Service
(NPS), doesn’t make use of devices, which detect trace and drugs, apparently
because the drug issue in prisons hasn’t been high.
Most of the NPS clients are
drug barons and traffickers and there are tendencies that they still run drugs
while in their cell rooms. Other inmates are recruited in prisons as drug
traffickers. Most of the inmates serving sentences are drug related cases and
they have money to play around while in jail. There were reported cases of drug
barons who still connect their gang in Europe with their mobile phones. With
phones, the barons control their business and make their bucks.
It was gathered that in many
Nigerian prisons visitors and corrupt staff have kept the level of inmate drug
abuse and trafficking constant over the past years despite concerted efforts to
reduce it.
A recent drug boom
smuggling in cell has been facilitated with phones especially with inmates
sometimes using phones to arrange drug deliveries.
Though no prison officials
have been indicted in drug deals but the temptations are there that they could
be lured into aiding and abetting drug running inside prison walls.
The relaxed visiting policy
at the Kirikiri Prisons and other prisons in Nigeria could be attributed to the
continuous inflow of drugs inside the four walls of the prisons.
Most of the prison
officials are not strict in knowing those visiting inmates as long as something-exchanged-
hands. With a kind of policy where you ‘drop something for the officials at the
gate’, the attempt to smuggle drugs inside prison is always going to be there.
Perhaps that was the mood
of a 35-year-old caterer in Lagos, was in when she was arrested for attempted
to smuggle cannabis hidden inside noodles to her boyfriend in prison. Her
skilled mode of concealment disappointed her when the officials at the Kirikiri
Prison, discovered the drug during routine examination of food items brought
for inmates. The suspect, Oyinyechi Ezirim during interrogation said that her
detained boyfriend directed her to a woman to collect two cartons of noodles
where the cannabis was buried.
The Lagos State commander
of the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA), Mr Aliyu Sule said that
the suspect who was transferred to the State command by the prison authority
would soon be charged to court for drug trafficking. “A 35-year-old single
lady, Oyinyechi Ezirim was transferred by the Prison authorities for smuggling
cannabis to inmates”, Sule added. “The compressed dried weeds concealed inside
noodles tested positive for cannabis and weighed 4.1kg. She will soon be
charged to court”. The street value of the drug is put at N300, 000.
“I used to buy noodles for my boyfriend who
has been in prison custody for one year. He promised to get married to me and
we have been in courtship. Last week, he told me that a former inmate promised
to send him two cartons of noodles. He asked me to contact the man on phone”,
she disclosed. “When I did, the man referred me to his wife who gave me the
noodles. Unfortunately, when I got to the prison, twenty packs of the noodles
were found to contain hemp. That was how I found myself in this case”. Oyinyechi
hails from Imo State and a certificate graduate of Imo School of Catering.
For one year, the suspect
has operated in the drug deal, a business she claimed not to be aware of; Her
boyfriend, whose name was not disclosed was alleged to be a drug dealer inside
the prison wall since he was convicted in alliance with the ex-inmate who have
finished his term but still runs the drug deal with his former mate in prison.
The inmate is alleged to be
an illicit drug distributor and other inmates buy from him. It was gathered
that a wrap of cannabis inside prison costs N200. Other high class drugs, like
cocaine, and heroin, are costlier and it’s only for the rich inmates who could
afford them.
There are indications that
NDLEA was going to carry out an extensive investigation into the matter since
the lady claimed that she wasn’t a first time offender in the deal.
She has been taking the
carton of noodles inside the prison for one year without any official detecting
her until last week when the bubble burst for her and her boyfriend. NDLEA
source disclosed that for the lady to be quizzed by the officials, adding that
the business may have gone sour.
The source, an expert in
drug bursting claimed that in every drug deal, blackmail, betrayal and denial
are part of the ‘game’, which working on the theory of conspiracy, officials
may know the woman in the last one year
Chairman/Chief Executive of
the NDLEA, Ahmadu Giade while commending the Prison authority said that the
case would be thoroughly investigated.
“I commend the Prison
authority for the arrest and prompt transfer of the suspect for prosecution.
This case will be properly investigated. We shall get to its root and arrest
other persons involved in the criminal act”, Giade warned. “Members of the
public must be careful in their dealings and avoid getting involved in drug
trafficking”.
Poor condition of the
prisons, inmates and officials could aide drug trafficking inside prison walls.
The case in point is the Kwale prison facility where the prison is near collapse
without maintenance and security. Giwa-Amu Igbono, a lawyer and a senior
partner, Stephen and Solomon Foundation, a Prison Ministry of the Knights of
St. Mulumba, Lekki Sub-Council, has in the last three years visited numerous
prisons in Nigeria and observed that anything could happen in prisons due to
poor conditions of the facilities existing in the prisons.
He said. “Kwale prison is a
national disgrace. Kwale prison is a centre that will encourage inmates into
more criminality. Kwale prisons represents man’s inhumanity to man. Kwale
prison is a pain if it meant to reflect reformatory systems of the judicial
injustices”, he added.
“Kwale prison is an effort
to embarrass Nigerian Prison Services (NPS). You have wonderful officers there
working hard and wanting to as much as possible comply with the standing orders
of the NPS, which provides for the welfare of the inmates. But how could they,
when they don’t have one functional vehicle to take inmates to court. Officers
in Kwale prison take inmates to court on a commercial motorcycle known as
Okada”. According to Amu, officers take inmates to court on Okada, including
those on capital punishment or death roll.
“I have seen it with my
eyes. I have visited the place and I know the place. They don’t have functional
pipe-borne water, no bore-hole, no power supply there. The walls of the prison
are cracking by day. It is a security risk”.
“Crime is ‘dynamic’, you will see inmates
drawing on the wall with pencil and biro just to find out the edge of the
joining blocks and see if they can remove the blocks and find a way of escape”,
Amu disclosed further.
According to Amu, the
prison officers are poorly paid and could be lured to do anything to make both
ends meet. “The arm-guards you have in prisons, you pay them N25, 000, a month,
do they have bullet proof. Do you expect them to go and risk their life for
N25, 000? The lowest serving officer in Nigerian prison earns N25, 000,
monthly.
And you will expect that
such a man will risk his life and you don’t think if he has an option of
escaping a prisoner, he won’t do it. Are you telling me that as a PA on N25,
000 and was offered N5million to escape a prisoner, he won’t do it, so, we
should not deceive ourselves”.
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