Articles and Related Media

Thanks CSC, From Nigeria

By Bill Rankin, Communications Officer, Communications and Consultation Sector
(March 2001)

The Correctional Service of Canada (CSC) receives letters each year from countries around the world requesting information on the Canadian corrections system or thanking the Service for publications that have introduced new ideas on how to improve their systems.

A representative of the Nigerian Prisons Service first wrote to CSC requesting material on our programs. He was sent a box-load of previous issues of Let's Talk, Contact and other source materials. Since then, he has become one of 121 international subscribers to Let's Talk. For developing countries with limited budgets, this kind of assistance is greatly appreciated, as you can see in the following excerpts from the letter.

LETTER OF APPRECIATION

I wish to register my profound gratitude to the Correctional Service of Canada for the books the department sent to me in October 2000. May the department continue to grow from strength to strength. In fact, I have almost gone through all the books and I have found them very educational, informative and interesting. Some of the books sent to me have given me the opportunity to know some new approaches to crime and corrections, e.g. restorative justice and conditional release, etc. It also affords me the opportunity to know what restorative justice and conditional releases mean and how each is being practiced or administered in Canada. These new approaches to crime and corrections are not existing in Nigeria.

In one word, one may conclude that incarceration is more humane in Canada than what we have in other parts of the globe, especially in African countries. The reason for the success so far recorded in Canada could be attributed to the greater attention paid to correctional service over there than in most African countries.

Once again I say thank you for the good gesture your organization extended to me through those books.

Thanks for your usual support.

OLAKUSEHIN SAMUEL
Nigerian Prisons Service
Ondo State
Nigeria, West Africa