A 48-years-old Nigerian man, Derrick Addai, has revealed how he spent an additional 14 years in prison due to a typographical error which saw his name omitted from a list of pardoned inmates in 2005.
Derrick had been imprisoned in Thailand for 5 years (2000 and 2005) before Olusegun Obasanjo, who was Nigeria’s president at the time, facilitated his repatriation into the country.
However, his name was omitted from a list of 30 inmates to be freed, causing him to spend more years behind bars in Nigeria.
Derrick explained that it took the intervention of the Osile of Oke-Ona, Oba Adedapo Tejuoso, and the Director-General of the Prison Rehabilitation Mission International, Bishop Kayode Williams to get him his freedom again.
Narrating his ordeal after securing his release recently, Derrick stated, “I spent 14 years in a Nigerian prison after I had spent five years and six months in Thailand’s prison from the year 2000, and I came back to Nigeria in 2005. It is quite unfortunate that my name was omitted from the list they brought then, and I spent time and money writing several letters for it to be corrected but, it did not work out.
“It happened that when they brought the list from Aso Rock, the letter was sealed and I was there and they asked me to open it. When I opened the letter, I saw that there were 30 names on the list, I just dropped it and left. After a few minutes, we were called back that one name was missing but that the numbers were complete.
“We called Obasanjo, Senator Lekan Mustapha and other people involved. They asked the officials to bring the letter to the office and when the man who wrote the names saw it, he insisted that that was not the list he sent and asked me to give him two days and the two days never came till now.”
Speaking on living conditions and lifestyles of prisoners, he said, “You can’t put people in prison without giving them anything. No work; they are just abandoned and earn nothing.
“No matter the condition or the environment, they should allow prisoners to do their handwork, but, when the prisoners don’t have any work or something they are doing there, when they come out, they will have nothing to do.”
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