Prisoners Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA) has asked the Federal Government to make the database of all detained Nigerians available to the public.
Dr. Uju Agomoh, the Executive Director of the security, justice and development focused Nongovernmental Organisation made the request while addressing a Press Conference in Abuja on Thursday.
She lamented that 19 institutions detain suspects in Nigeria but there was no statistics of those in the custody of those agencies of government.
"It is strange that those detained by the Department of State Security, Police and other security agencies are not known, Dr. Agomoh said. "As a nation, we need to have the database of those detained".
She maintaining that "when these figures are made public, it will reduce extra-judicial killings."
The PRAWA boss also called for the reduction in the number of Awaiting Trial Persons (ATP) in the prisons across the country through the introduction of new reforms in the criminal justice system.
While expressing dismay with the alarming number of ATP in prison custody, she said "only countries just coming out of war have such high number of awaiting trial persons."
According to figures from the Assistant Controller-General of Prisons in charge of Planning, Research and Statistics, Suraj Olarinde, 68% of the inmates in Nigerian prisons are awaiting trial. This, Dr. Uju Agomoh said, is the worst in Africa.