Minna Prison Attack Not Jailbreak – Service

The Nigerian Prisons Service has finally spoken on the recent attack on Minna Medium Security Prison at Tunga area of the State.

The incident had led to the death of a prison officer and a motorcyclist.

Francis Enobore, the service’s Public Relations Officer in a statement to the News Agency of Nigeria said the unfortunate incident at the Minna Medium Security Prison was an attack, not a jail break.

“Perhaps educating the members of the public on the different terms wrongly used by people would go a long way in helping the masses.

“The terms Escape, Jail break and Prison have completely different meanings to the Nigeria Prisons Service

“To start with, Escape is basically when one or two persons scale out of watch, which may not necessarily involve any damage to the infrastructure.

“Jail break is an internal crisis generated from within and which will eventually lead to mass escape of prisoners.

“Prison attack occurs when there is an external invasion on the facilities and that was exactly what happened in the case of the unfortunate incident at Minna.

“Group of criminals came through, fully armed and attacked our men on duty just to carry out their mission and freed some prisoners in our custody,” he said

The PRO also said the NPS had spoken to other sister security agencies to establish more collaboration to curb the crime rate in the country, adding that fortified cells would soon be built.

“Majority of the inmates that were apprehended after the escape were returned by their family members because they had the understanding of what Prison looked like.

“This shows the effort of the Controller General of the Nigerian Prison Service, Mr Ja’afaru Ahmed, was yielding positive result since he assumed office

“When the law finally catches up with all the escapees, they would be duly punished,” the PRO added.