Enugu — The Prisoners Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA), a non-governmental organisation has expressed concern over increasing cases of torture and various forms of brutalisation against helpless people in the country.

PRAWA noted that brutality and torture being inflicted by some unscrupulous policemen and other security agents was a common knowledge. It called on the government and other spirited bodies to find a lasting solution to the problem.

Executive Director of PRAWA, Dr. Uju Agomoh at a four-day workshop on "Torture Documentation and Redress Scheme", said that the idea of the seminar was to find a lasting solution to the problem.

Agomoh, who expressed bitterness about the number of people that have been killed extra-judicially by the police and other agents of the state said that no civilised society can condone such situation, adding that it was this development that moved her organisation to begin efforts to address the problem.

"We believe that it is necessary that we do something to address this issue not just complain about it. That it is key to this work. We think it is necessary to find ways of addressing these incidents that have been so rampant", she said.

She recalled that officials of the United Nations while on a visit to the country complained about extra judicial killing.

"The Amnesty International also released a report sometime last year which pointed their finger at the same issue, accusing Nigeria of its widespread application of torture", he said.

She disclosed that her organisation has been involved in advocacy and awareness in an attempt to check torture in the country.

Agomoh explained that part of the workshop involving legal faculties of tertiary institutions was to see how they can develop a draft curriculum to integrate documentation of redress of torture.

"If we succeed there, it means that the next generation will be more educated about this. So that if a lawyer graduates from the law school, if a doctor comes out from a medical school, at least in principle they will understand fundamentals of torture documentation and redress scheme. So this is the way of institutionalising this programme to ensure its sustainability beyond the three year project at this moment", she said.

Former Deputy Vice Chancellor of University of Nigeria, Enugu Campus (UNEC), Prof. Peter Ebigbo in a paper titled "Psychological Assessment and Intervention Strategies for Psychological Consequences of Torture", pointed out that the most frequently encountered severe psychopathologies among persons that experienced torture include depression and anxiety disorder.