Government must make ex-inmates assets to society

Many criminals are roaming our neighborhoods. They have bloodshot-eyes in the morning and it doesn’t strike me that the government keeps tab on them. Government must see the need to save people who even though live in decent environments have their futures threatened by wandering gangsters. What angers me more is the high level of laxity in our cities. You have sex parlours in housing neighbourhoods, strip-tease clubs in same, criminals on the loose, some widows whose husbands bequeathed houses to them have become haridans, converted the exterior of these houses into beer parlors, wine bars, watering holes, where people smoke freely/openly, shout at the top of their voices but the tenants on these streets and landlords don’t complain. These same people who are quick to lay all blames on government never start a protest movement to move these activities to far-flung centers of the town and not in residential quarters.
You see these criminals around filling stations. Somewhere near me, on a street where they smoke weed openly, at community motor- parks where they serve as toll agents and outside sex-parlours in the housing neighborhood. It is absurd to have this people gradually becoming predators in places where everyone soon becomes a potential prey.
What do convicts learn in Nigerian prisons? Do they even learn anything at all? Convicts in prisons should be taught to think for themselves outside the bars and not blend into the fold again. Blending into the fold seems to be the Nigerian way. I hear prison life offers them the chance to become plumbers, carpenters, electricians and so on. But most of these fellows I see around don’t look like people who have honed any skill in any prison.
Even if they have such skills, are employers willing to engage them? Do ex-convicts have the social skills to fit into open society? The ones I see around are either grumpy or talk gruffly. They ask for money as a birthright. I have heard two of them talk excitedly outside a hair salon about duels with police officers, in times past.
For those who served time as a result of drugs, there should be rehabilitation centers for them to attend on government’s account. And ex-convicts should be let out on conditional probation in Nigeria. It is not enough to be out only because they have paid their social dues to society in jail.
Acceptance of convicts – even in religious environment- is still a major problem in Nigeria. And the numerous non-governmental organisations in charge of helping people out of prison to find a bearing in life, before venturing into the society are only interested in the money side of things. No disrespect to their efforts but most are fraudulent outfits. And, some of the non-nationals who run these outfits in Nigeria get a lot of money from foreign companies; but they in collusion with their Nigerian collaborators – give only a little on the vulnerable.
It is the responsibility of every government to take the safety of people seriously. Such a government must have plans to take care of convicts who have repented and converted. People who have converted, walk with drooping shoulders but those who have only repented and refused to convert drool over and on our society with filth.
Simon Abah, Port Harcourt