Uju Agomoh

Beginning in 1994 with the launch of her organization PRAWA (Prisoners Rehabilitation and Welfare Action), Uju has organized and led the ongoing movement to shift Nigeria's federal penal system from pure incarceration to rehabilitation-focused corrections and, in the process, also work with state-level prison system to ensure that these same changes take place.

Uju shifted the focus of PRAWA’s work decisively from advocacy to systemic overhaul when the headquarters of the federal prison system located in Abuja accepted her recommendation and in 2016 put her in charge of a 52 member network of investigative journalists with an interest in prison reform whom she had carefully cultivated from across Nigeria, and a similar network of prison officials she had cultivated at the same time, who understood the terrible conditions of the country’s federal prison system and that public awareness had to be strengthened a gradual and deep process could be undertaken.

The building of trust between the media and the prison system had three elements. The first was that prison officials would, for the first time, allow journalists to interview prison officials and inmates about conditions in the prisons. The second was the launch of the Family Link Program, which reconnected inmates with their relatives and emphasized the importance of prison officials at the federal and state levels in implementing visitation and opening the public conversation about the importance of social ties in reducing repeat offenses and facilitating the prisoners’ rehabilitation. And the third was to launch sensitivity training simultaneously for prison guards at the prison facilities where the first and second elements of this process were unfolding.

This was followed by an announcement in 2019 jointly by leaders of civil society organizations and representatives of the Federal Ministry of Interior on the drafting and reviewing of what became the Nigerian Correctional Services Act of 2019. This law ultimately called for Nigeria’s 253 prisons in Nigeria’s 37 subnational units to transition into rehabilitative institutions. It formally introduced non-custodial measures to be put in place, including parole, community service, and probation.

In addition to monitoring the implementation of this law's provisions, Uju has also authored the Custodial and Non-Custodial Standing Order, an operational guide now used by correctional systems in Nigeria, Rwanda, Kenya, Ghana, Burundi, Zambia, and the DRC.

The closed nature of the Nigerian prison system, along with the broader context of political detention and systemic human rights violations, has deep historical roots that trace back more than half a century. These issues became particularly entrenched during Nigeria’s long periods of military rule, especially from the late 1960s through to the return of civilian governance in 1999. During the era of successive military regimes—most notably between 1996 and 1999—the prison system was routinely exploited as a tool of political repression. Dissidents, journalists, pro-democracy activists, and perceived opponents of the state were arbitrarily arrested, detained without trial, and subjected to various forms of state-sanctioned abuse. The judiciary was often undermined or bypassed entirely, allowing the executive and security apparatus unchecked authority over the detention process.

Although the transition to civilian rule in 1999 was expected to usher in a new era of transparency, accountability, and respect for the rule of law, progress has been inconsistent. Subsequent democratic administrations have made some advances, including the enactment of reforms aimed at strengthening judicial independence and protecting civil liberties. However, isolated but troubling reports continue to surface about the misuse of the judicial and prison systems to silence opposition voices and quell civil dissent. In particular, police brutality, arbitrary arrests, and prolonged pre-trial detention remain persistent problems, particularly in the context of public protests and political unrest.

A glaring symptom of the dysfunction within the Nigerian criminal justice system is the overwhelming prevalence of pre-trial detention. According to research conducted by the Prisoners’ Rehabilitation and Welfare Action (PRAWA), approximately 69% of individuals held in Nigerian state and federal prisons have not been convicted of any crime; they are instead being held in prolonged “awaiting trial” status. This figure underscores a broader systemic failure marked by an overburdened judiciary, chronic underfunding, administrative inefficiencies, and a lack of access to legal representation for most detainees. The result is a punitive system in which thousands of citizens are effectively imprisoned without due process, often for years at a time.

Of those who have been convicted, a significant number are imprisoned for petty or non-violent offenses, such as street hawking or traffic violations, for which the stipulated fines are often prohibitively expensive. Many of these individuals languish in prison not because of the severity of their crimes, but because of their poverty. Their cases are frequently delayed, and they are unable to secure bail or navigate a complex legal system that favors the wealthy and politically connected. The remainder of the prison population comprises those convicted of more serious crimes, many of whom are confined in overcrowded, unsanitary facilities that foster violence, psychological trauma, and the spread of disease—conditions that often exacerbate criminal behavior rather than rehabilitate offenders.

An additional challenge to reform is the lack of reliable data and oversight. While an estimated 87% of criminal cases in Nigeria are handled at the state level, coordination between state and federal justice systems remains poor. Although eighteen state-level commissions are tasked with collecting data on the outcomes of police investigations, there is no centralized, regularly updated national database that tracks individuals currently incarcerated across the country. Basic information, such as detainees' names, locations, and legal status, is often unavailable or incomplete. This lack of transparency makes monitoring detention conditions, tracking case progress, or holding law enforcement and judicial institutions accountable for abuses nearly impossible.

Uju started her work with PRAWA (Prisoners Rehabilitation and Welfare Action) in 1994 as a transformative figure, recognizing that meaningful change required addressing systemic flaws in the Nigerian Prisons Service at the root. She started by setting up the Penal Reform Media Network (PERMNET), comprising 52 carefully selected journalists committed to investigative reporting on Nigerian Prisons. Uju worked with these journalists to humanize stories of inmates, shifting public perception of prisoners from mere criminals to individuals deserving dignity. This initial work paved the way for her full acceptance by the Nigerian Prison authorities and equipped her with firsthand knowledge of what could be done from a legislative angle to set the Nigerian Prisons Service on a path of progress. Leveraging on the success of opening up the Nigerian Prisons, she collaborated with Prison Authorities to design comprehensive programs to get correctional staff to see themselves as “agents of change” tasked with promoting dignity, rehabilitation, and human rights for inmates. She quickly followed up this strategy with the Family Link Program, which she designed to reconnect inmates with their relatives, thus overcoming longstanding institutional resistance to visitation rights, recognizing that maintaining family bonds was crucial for successful reintegration.

Leveraging her deep understanding of the Nigerian Prisons system, Uju mobilized a network that brought the Federal Ministry of Interior, leadership of the Nigerian Prison Authority, and other citizen-sector leaders to drive for a reform of the Nigerian Correctional framework. The reform yielded the Nigerian Correctional Services Act of 2019 with a transformative philosophy of rehabilitation. Embedded within the new act were non-custodial measures such as parole, probation, community service, and restorative justice, which Uju, as the principal author, felt were crucial to bring Nigeria’s correctional framework to global standards and decongest Nigerian prisons. To fully operationalize the non-custodial component of the new act, Uju, in collaboration with the leadership of the newly renamed Nigerian Correctional Services, rolled out a strategic operational guide across Nigeria in the form of the Non-Custodial Standing Order to bring judges up to the awareness curve on the existence of non-custodial facilities and specially trained correctional personnel to handle non-custodial convictions. Moreover, Uju and her PRAWA team are providing ongoing operational guidance in the form of physical and virtual workshops for non-custodial officers across all correctional centers in Nigeria and in all training institutions of the Nigerian Correctional Service. To date, the Nigerian Correctional Service has recorded over 500 convictions in 8 states, showing that with time, non-custodial convictions will be equally as widespread as custodial convictions, significantly reducing Nigeria’s prison population.

Furthermore, Uju has also operationalized the non-custodial standing order across Rwanda, Kenya, Ghana, Burundi, Zambia, and the DRC through her Prison Reform Intervention in Africa (PRAI) Project. The project focuses on training correctional officers in international human rights standards, establishing a penal reform media network, and increasing the frequency and quality of media reporting on correctional issues.

To further solidify her work, Uju led the establishment of a computer-based system for the Nigerian Correctional Service. First, she piloted a computer-based case management system at the headquarters of the correctional service and seconded PRAWA staff as in-house support staff. As a result of the success of the pilot, Uju mobilized funding support from Justice4All, British Council, and The EU Commission for a nationwide rollout across all 37 state commands. Through this massive platform, Uju brought all correctional officers in charge of records to upskill them on the new computer-based system for more efficient record-keeping. Currently, the federal government through the National Identity Management Commission has partnered with the Nigerian Correctional Service to collect and upload the biometrics of inmates across all correctional centers and upload to the central management database. This has significantly improved the data management of the Nigerian correctional service. Currently, the system updates and shows the total number of all inmates on the Nigerian Correctional Services website in real time. Due to this operational efficiency, jailbreaks are easily tracked and fleeing inmates are easily rounded up back to the facilities.

In addition to all that she has done, Uju has developed a full curriculum for paralegal training, and she is working with ten universities to institutionalize it. So far, she has connected the universities to the Legal Aid Council for operationalization. In addition to that, she and her team have also launched a legal aid app to educate and connect people with pro bono human lawyers. Through her community radio, PRAWA Radio, her team broadcasts emerging trends in the correctional services space both in Nigeria and Africa.

Currently, Uju’s non-profit PRAWA has a staff strength of 29 full time staff, and 109 part-time staff of which 45 are paralegals. Since inception, PRAWA has upskilled over 50,000 prison officers, police officers, and other justice sector practitioners. PRAWA has also provided direct support to 108,000 prisoners, ex-prisoners, youths at risk, torture victims and their families, with over 69 publications on the subjects of prisons, justice, security sector, torture and social development.

Uju was born the last of five children. As a child, her father would have her listen in on adult conversations with his friends and have her give him a summary and what she thought about the conversations. Later, she graduated to following him to extended family meetings and learned from him that “if you bring value, you earn a seat at the table.”

Her journey into social entrepreneurship began in 1990 during her youth service in Ondo State, Nigeria, where she was assigned to work with the police force. Living in the barracks, she was placed in the police public relations unit, where her primary responsibility involved monitoring newspapers for public grievances against the police. Her role required her to meticulously cut out relevant articles, organize them, and draft responses for the Commissioner of Police's approval. As she sifted through the files containing these complaints, she was struck by their increasing volume and severity, which painted a troubling picture of the police force's relationship with the community. This exposure to the persistent issues of misconduct and the resulting public outcry resonated with her, igniting a desire to use her interest in a career of public interest law to address these problems systemically. She later got a scholarship to study criminology at Cambridge University. While there, she saw how NGOs, not just the government, could support incarcerated individuals. After her program, she returned to Nigeria, desiring to join an organization working in the prison sector. Unfortunately, she couldn’t find any. So, she started going into prisons on her own to gather data. This was a time when NGOs were not allowed into the Nigerian prisons. However, she found a way to enter for research purposes.

Her ‘Aha’ moment came much later when, on her birthday, she wanted to take food to a correctional centre and celebrate her day with the inmates. When she wanted to know how many inmates she should prepare for, one of the ranking officers in the prisons persuaded her instead to do something more life-changing for the inmates, instead of simply bringing them food and leaving afterwards, leaving them with their problems. He shared with her that there were some inmates who had been detained for a long time simply because they couldn’t pay their fines. He told her, “Why don’t you use the money to pay their fines instead? That way, they can go home.” She requested the list and paid for almost 200 inmates to go home. Afterwards, she discovered that almost the same number of inmates were brought in with larger fines the following month. That was when she knew she needed to do something more systemic to move the needle in the direction of change. She then started working closely with the officers of the correctional service on inmates’ welfare, health, nutrition, and general well-being.

Today, Uju is well known across Nigeria as the leader of the prisoners’ rights and welfare movement due to her work of bringing the plight of prisoners to mainstream discourse. Till date, Uju has implemented over 72 projects on security, justice, corrections and development related issues in many African countries including Nigeria, Kenya, Rwanda, Burundi, Zambia, Democratic Republic of Congo, Ghana, and the Gambia. She has personally carried out over 1000 prison /monitoring visits covering over 150 prisons in 32 countries. She has authored/co-authored 30 books, 4 training manuals and directed the production of 4 audio-visual documentaries on death penalty, treatment of mentally ill prisoners, torture, and prison conditions in Nigeria.