Recently, Legal Aid Council of Nigeria with support from the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) and the European Union (EU), organised a two day national workshop on mental health and justice in Nigeria, with the theme: “Strategies for Effective and Humane Management of Prisoners with Mental Health Challenges. The event brought together critical stakeholders in the criminal justice system in Abuja to rob minds on the challenges of mental impairment. AMEH EJEKWONYILO reports
The teething problem of mental health challenges in Nigeria’s criminal justice system came to the fore a forthnight ago, as stakeholders in the sector converged on Abuja to brainstorm on how best to fight mental disorder among prison inmates in the country.
Each of the stakeholders painted the pathetic picture of the inhumane condition of inmates with mental health challenges. One of the presentations that shocked and held participants at the two day event spellbound was Dr. Ujuh Agomoh, Executive Director of Prisoners’ Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA)’s hour long audio-visual documentary on prisoners with mental health challenges titled: “The Double Victims”, elicited strong emotions from the audience as it chronicled the dehumanizing state of prisoners in what was termed “asylum” at the Enugu prisons.
The PRAWA boss averred that inmates with mental health issues were double victims, as they were either abandoned their families or despised by the society. “There have been cases where mentally challenged persons have been rejected or allegedly killed by members of their families or community upon release.”
She stated: “Persons with mental illnesses often face difficulties with respect to ensuring the protection of their basic human rights in many developing countries and communities. The issue of imprisoning mentally ill persons presents two failed public policies: the failure of the public officials to ensure an effective mental health system, and an overly ambitious criminal justice system that tends to send people to prison for low-level, non-violent crimes and for non-criminal behaviour.”
Dr. Agomoh further disclosed gave the statistics of mentally ill persons in prison custody across the country. “The 2012 National Human Rights Commission of Nigeria prison audit revealed that in the North-Eastern Zone of Nigeria, 4 out of 37 prisons had 20 mentally ill inmates. In the North-West, they were 121 while 289 were found in the South-Eastern Zone.
She decried what she called “very questionable process” through which these persons are processed through the criminal justice system from the point of arrest by the police, to the court and to the prisons, and said: “Every encounter with a prison lunatic is a trial of the Nigerian state.”
The PRAWA Executive Director said the problem seemed multi-faceted involving factors within and outside the criminal justice system and are often necessitated by corruption, negative stigmatization, poor legislative framework and policy, and lack of awareness, skills and oversights in relation to the treatment of mentally disabled persons.
According to prison statistics, these inmates are classified into two categories: ‘Civil lunatics, and ‘Criminal lunatics.
How PRAWA tackled the problem
In trying to address some of these challenges, Dr. Agomoh said: “PRAWA has carried out several activities. From 2000 to 2002 and 2008 to 2010, PRAWA included mentally ill persons as one of the issues highlighted under its programme, Vulnerable Prisoners Assistance Project (VAP) as well as the Prison Decongestion and Re-entry Scheme (PDRS). PRAWA also facilitated the release of over 120 in Enugu Prisons mentally ill persons between 2007 and 2010 and the diversion of some of these persons from prisons to the Federal Neuro-psychiatric Hospital, Enugu.
Nigeria Prisons Perspective
In a paper titled, “Mentally Ill Persons in Nigeria Prisons: The Statistics, Challenges and Recommended Way Forward, the Acting Comptroller General of Nigeria Prisons Service, Alhaji Aminu Suley, said: “Medical reports revealed that 64 million Nigerians suffer from one form of mental illness or the other. Despite the country’s population which stands at over 160 million, there are only about 150 psychiatrists”, this development he said translates to a ratio of one psychiatrist to over 1 million Nigerians.
Alhaji Suley who was represented by Dr. Peter Ekpendo noted that Nigerian prisons were not merely places of custody but institutions for reform and rehabilitation of prisoners. He decried the attitude of families and communities that deliberately throw people with mental ill-health into the criminal justice system.
Legal Aid Council insight
The Director General of the Legal Aid Council of Nigeria, Mrs. Joy Bob-Manuel in an address titled: Providing services for prisoners with mental health challenges: Who pays the bills?, suggested the review of existing laws, provision of adequate funding for the maintenance of prison inmates that are suffering from mental disorder.
She decried the current practice where only relatives of mentally ill prisoners were empowered to fund the transportation of such persons to “asylum”. The Legal Aid Council boss called for more favourable policies from all levels of government to ensure that mentally ill inmates were properly taken care of.
The keynote speaker, Dr. Akintunde Akinkunmi who spoke on, “Strategies for Effective and Humane Management of Prisoners with Mental Health Challenges”, said mental ill health was a challenge to fair trial, while urging the National Assembly to quickly pass into law the pending mental bill before it.
Akinkunmi advised the council to set up a mental health assessment committee to include experts such as forensic psychiatrists and clinical psychologists as well as other relevant stakeholders to arrest the problem.
Recommendations
The acting Comptroller General of Nigeria Prisons, Alhaji Suley said: “There is need to develop the capacity of the prisons to provide mental health care services to inmates.”
He urged collaborative initiatives among criminal justice agencies, civil society organizations and mental health institutions.
In spite of these challenges, the Dr. Agomoh recommended that increased backing from relevant government supervising institutions such as the Ministries of Health, Interior and Justice would effectively tackle the problem, adding that the workshop was intended to address the current plight of mentally ill prisoners, which results mainly from factors within and outside the criminal justice system. She highlighted such factors to include: corruption, negative stigmatization, poor legislative framework and policy, and lack of awareness and skills in the treatment of persons with mental health challenges.
Mr. Akinkunmi advised the council to set up a mental health assessment committee to be chaired by a forensic psychiatrist and other relevant stakeholders.
A representative of the Federal Capital Territory (FCT) Chief Judge, Justice Ibrahim Bukar, Justice Sylvanus Oriji charged the participants to implement all the recommendations that were reached at the end of the workshop.