A senior management official from the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS) has addressed the claims made by Nigerian crossdresser Idris Okuneye, also known as Bobrisky, regarding his alleged incarceration in a private apartment.
Recall that controversial activist, VeryDarkMan, shared a video in which Bobrisky purportedly claimed that he bribed some Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) officials to drop the money laundering charge against him.
In the footage, a voice allegedly belonging to Bobrisky also claimed that a “godfather” alongside Haliru Nababa, the controller general of the Nigerian Correctional Service (NCoS), ensured she served the six-month sentence in a private apartment and not in prison.
However, in an interview with The PUNCH, a high-ranking officer said that what people called VIP treatment for certain prisoners was a special facility that had existed for years.
According to the officer, custodial centres have different facilities and prisoners’ conditions (health, age, sex) determine which facility they stay in to serve their jail term.
The officer said, “There are different facilities in the custodial centres across the country, and it is not out of place to treat some of the prisoners according to their health conditions, sex, age, and category of the sentence. Importantly, the prison authority also considers human rights and the treatment of the prisoners.
“The case of Bobrisky is an eye-opener for us. The NCoS authority confirmed that he is a woman from the middle upward, while he is a man from the middle downward. We had never had such a person in our custody, and there is no facility for such a situation. He had to be placed in a separate cell so that he wouldn’t be abused. That facility is what he ignorantly called a private apartment.
“Whether VIP or not, the condition of a prisoner will determine the facility he/she is going to stay in. We can’t put a prisoner who has high blood pressure in a cell without enough ventilation.”
