Minister of Interior, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, has advised officers and men of the defence and security forces to remain vigilant to be able to defeat criminal elements terrorising the country.

Aregbesola stated this when he paid a surprise visit to Kirikiri Maximum and Medium Security Prisons in Kirikiri, Lagos.

He asked the Nigerian Prisons Service to ensure that those who breach its walls never lived to tell their story.

He said: “We must acknowledge our servicemen and security agencies, who have sacrificed a lot to make this possible. We must equally charge them to remain eternally vigilant and continuously evolve strategies, and to define these strategies, we have to make decisions based not on fear, but on hard-earned wisdom.

“I have also informed our officers and men here that they must fight to defend our institutions, territory and constitution. It also applies to all others wherever they are posted in Nigeria.

‘’The ragtag groups of opportunist must not be allowed to attack our institutions and get away. They must not live to tell the story.”

Media aide to the minister, Mr Sola Fasure, who confirmed the visit, said Aregbesola directed the management of the Prisons service to improve its efforts at gathering actionable intelligence which he said was the panacea to solving the problem of incessant prisons attacks.

He said: “So far, no jailbreak by inmates has been successful, we have successfully quelled all of them. What we have recurring since the #EndSARS protests of October 2020 has been a mass of people attacking our facilities from outside and setting the inmates free.

“However, I have now directed the Comptroller General of Prisons to double his efforts on intelligence gathering to fortify and prevent breaches to the priosns beyond the use of arms and force.’’