The Director General, Legal Aid Council of Nigeria, Mrs Joy Bob Manuel, has called for establishment of remand homes for awaiting trial inmates across the country to ease prison congestion.

She made the call in an interview yesterday in Abuja.

Manuel said that in spite of efforts by the council and other stakeholders to ensure decongestion, no remarkable achievement had been made because convicts and awaiting trial inmates were kept in the same prisons.

"For there to be remarkable decongestion of prisons, there is a need for government to establish remand homes to accommodate awaiting trial inmates.

"When a case has not been decided, the only place the magistrate can remand is in prison and this is because we do not have remand homes.

"Awaiting trial inmates shouldn't be in the prison. They should be in remand homes," she said.

Manuel also called for the empowerment of inmates awaiting trial in order to keep them from returning to the prisons after their cases had been decided by the court.

NAN