Suspects detained in post-election violence have rioted at an overcrowded jail in northern Nigeria and more than a dozen of them escaped, a prisons official said on Saturday.
Andrew Barka, controller of prisons in Adamawa state, said 18 of the 600 arrested this week escaped but six were later captured.
The prison in the state capital Yola, which has a capacity for 900 inmates, was already full when the 600 were thrown into the jail.
“There was heavy congestion. The living conditions have worsened since the suspects were brought in,” Barka told AFP.
“Therefore yesterday they went on riot, burning a section of our (training) workshop and injuring two wardens. Some of them tried to escape by scaling over the fence.”
Rights groups estimate that more than 1,000 people have been arrested since the riots broke out after last weekend’s election won by incumbent President Goodluck Jonathan, a southern Christian.
Riots in several states in mainly Muslim northern Nigeria after the election claimed nearly 250 lives, according to a rights group, and displaced 74,000 people.
Military patrols and curfews have largely restored calm in the affected states.
Barka said the situation in Yola had been brought under control, dismissing local media speculation that the jailbreak may have been organised by suspected members of a radical sect based in the north.
An Islamist sect, Boko Haram, last year freed more than 700 prisoners during an attack in nearby Bauchi state.
Apr242011