Nigeria releases 4,000 prisoners due to prison overcrowding

Many people are imprisoned for minor offenses.

The release of prisoners is part of a large-scale campaign by Nigerian President Bola Ahmed Tinubu to fulfill a campaign promise he made during his election campaign in February, when he promised to address the country's overcrowded prison system if elected president.

"Yesterday (November 18), we released 4,068 people out of 80,804 prisoners in 253 prisons nationwide. These are people who were detained because they could not pay fines," Mr. Olubunmi Tunji-Ojo informed on his account X (former Twitter name).

The minister made the statement after visiting Kuje prison near the capital Abuja.

Responding to AFP, Interior Ministry spokesman Ajibola Afonja confirmed that only prisoners fined no more than 1 million naira (about 30 million VND) will be released in this batch.

Mr Afonja added that a total of 585 million naira in fines had been rescinded to secure the release of the said prisoners.

In addition to releasing prisoners for minor crimes, President Tinubu has also introduced new reforms in the justice system, including implementing sentences that do not require incarceration to avoid overcrowding in the prison system.

The United Nations has noted that Nigeria’s prisons are extremely overcrowded, with some being 147% over capacity. Many detainees have to wait years before they can be tried in court.

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