By Osaro Okhomina, Simon Ebegbulem & Tony Edike
Posted to the Web: Thursday, September 29, 2005

A bizarre drama also played itself out yesterday at the Enugu Prisons when about 15 prisoners beat up a female Assistant Superintendent of Prisons and her inspector husband, allegedly on the order of a superior prison official.

No life was lost in the Auchi jail-break, but a combined team of policemen and prisons officials was deployed to the area to quell the riot and fish out fleeing prisoners. Their efforts yielded some fruits with the arrest of 10 of the prisoners.

The Acting Comptroller of Prisons, Mr Okwara Uche Kalu, yesterday relocated to Auchi to meet with the Comptroller of the Auchi Prison, Mr Kingsley Otutu, and other top officers of the prisons, declaring that the incident would be investigated by the authorities. Those found wanting would be dealt with, he vowed.
Vanguard gathered that the jail-break occurred around 3p.m. during the call for lunch within the prison yards. It lasted only a few minutes. It was gathered that the authorities of the prisons were caught off guard by the irate prisoners who attacked them with dangerous weapons reportedly stolen from the workshop.

Among the fleeing inmates were four men on the death row. Vanguard observed that security was yesterday beefed up at entry and exit points in Auchi town, as armed policemen embarked on a stop and search operation.

Speaking with Vanguard on telephone, the state Commissioner of Police, Mr Muktar Abass, confirmed the incident and said the Police were still trying to unravel the mystery behind the jail-break. He said plain cloth police officers had been deployed to the area to assist in the search for escaped prisoners.”We can confirm now that the incident happened and we have sent out appeals to community heads and youths in the area to assist in the re-arrest of the prisoners.”

Prisoners beat up ASP, husband at Enugu prisons

Meanwhile, an Assistant Superintendent of Prisons at the Enugu Prisons, Mrs. Francisca Okoli, and her husband, Inspector Gabriel, were beaten up yesterday by over 15 prisoners allegedly on the orders of a superior prison official after ordering the eviction of the couple from the barracks.

The incident which occurred at about 10a.m., caused panic in the barracks located opposite the prisons headquarters as passers-by who did not understand what was happening scampered for safety, fearing that it was a jail-break.

Household items including furniture, kitchen utensils as well as make-shift houses within the barracks were either thrown out or destroyed by the stern-looking prisoners who were led by the Chief Superintendent of Prisons, Mr. Mike Iroegbu.

ASP Okoli whose uniform was torn and with blood stains all over her body, narrated her ordeal to Vanguard, saying the prisoners who acted on the instruction of a superior prisons officer invaded her three-bedroom quarters in the barracks and started throwing her belongings outside.

Okoli, who is the Secretary to the Commandant of the Nigerian Prisons Training School, Enugu, said an attempt by herself and her husband to stop them attracted serious blows from the prisoners who also used clubs to inflict injuries on them, adding that her husband was beaten into unconsciousness.

She said: “At about 10a.m. today (yesterday), I was coming from my office at Prisons Training School, Enugu. When I got to my house, I saw about 15 prisoners led by an officer shouting at my husband. When I got there, I told him that the quarters was allocated to me by my boss, the Commandant of the Training School, Enugu, who has the authority to allocate quarters meant for the Training School to the officers.

“After narrating this to him, he went ahead and ordered the prisoners to beat me and my husband up and to throw our property outside. They beat the two of us mercilessly to the point that my husband became unconscious. I also sustained severe injury with blood all over my body. I later fainted and some sympathisers rescued me.”

Displaying her digital Sony video camera valued at N150,000, which she claimed was smashed during the attack, Okoli alleged that N80,000 cash was stolen from her house, adding that her property thrown out by the prisoners were still scattered outside the premises as she had no other place to move them in.

“I have made a formal complaint to the Deputy Commandant of the Prisons Training School over the matter. Many senior officers from the training school had gone to the officer to ascertain if he actually ordered the prisoners to beat them up. He showed no remorse. Rather, he admitted that he ordered that our property be thrown out.

“I am surprised by the action of the officer. How can the prisoners we are meant to reform be turned to thugs and weapons against the Prisons officers? I call on the Prisons authorities to intervene and call the officer to order because it is completely wrong to use prisoners as weapons against prisons’ wardens. If they are being used as weapons, what kind of reformation and rehabilitation are we giving them? This officer must be called to order,” she said in tears.

But when contacted yesterday, Chief Superintendent of Prison Iroegbu, who led the operation, said the action was in line with the directive by the Federal Ministry of Internal Affairs to various prisons commands across the country to sanitise the barracks following the recent jail-breaks in Port Harcourt and Lagos.

He said Mrs. Okoli and her husband illegally occupied the quarters which was meant for senior officers of the command, adding that they (Okolis) forced their way into the apartment shortly after the occupant vacated it on Monday. According to him, the couple had been living in their official apartment within the barracks from where they parked into the senior quarters “through the back door.”