A fix for the nigerian prison crisis
To solve the nigerian prison problem (overcrowding, imprisonment without trial), I believe that the government should look to the past. Prisoners convicted of crimes who will serve 10 years or more, and who are physically fit should be transferred to help build a prison village, on land that will be purchased in the grasslands of Nigeria. These prisoners should physically and manually build a new and huge prison complex in an isolated area. As they build, they are hosted there, and new prisoners continue to build and expand the complex. Prisoners within the prisons are put to work on simple but productive tasks, like making jeans, binding books, etc. The prison acts as a human factory.
The area should be dotted with many different and separate prisons, and everyday the prisoners go out and build new prisons. In the same area, there would be a heavy security presence to prevent break-outs, and also several court of appeals, as well as hotel hosting for civilian and NGOs that want to address the issues of people wrongly imprisoned. Prison records should be possible and checkable. When people have faith that criminals stay in prison, they are more likely to deliver them to the police.
There will also be rehabilitation centers built in the same area (these are to be private), that should help train newly released prisoners. Overtime, a new town should develop beside the prison complex that should pull in many of the ex-cons, and give them an alternative to going back to their old haunts and their old activities.
