Governors must execute or commute
Comptroller-General of the Nigeria Prisons Service (NPS) Mr. Ahmed Ja’afaru recently raised an alarm over the fate of 1,640 persons condemned to death by various courts but who are still languishing around in the prisons. The Comptroller-General (CG), who was represented by Assistant Comptroller-General (ACG) of Prisons Mohammed Bedi, said state governors’ unwillingness to sign death warrants for the condemned criminals’ execution is a big challenge to NPS.
Speaking at a round table discussion for criminal justice actors in Benue State, the CG said a condemned person is “inevitably at his last bus-stop” and therefore becomes vicious “as death does not really matter to him anymore.” He said the only hope left for a condemned person who has utilized his chances of appeal up to the Supreme Court to escape death is for a governor to commute his death sentence to a prison term. He said while state governors are not too willing to endorse death sentences, they are not commuting them either.
Media reports indicate that some of the condemned persons have been on death row for well over 20years. They are held in various prisons that have facilities and cells to hold those that have been sentenced to death but awaiting execution. Prisons that have these facilities and where condemned persons are being held are Kirikiri Maximum Security Prison, Lagos; Ibara Prison in Abeokuta; Agodi Prison in Ibadan; as well as Kaduna, Kano, Port Harcourt and Enugu prisons.
While the number of condemned criminals whose execution has not been effected is a matter of concern, the congestion in condemned cells where they are being held is more worrisome. The cells are over-filled with condemned persons; overstretching the facilities beyond the capacity for which they were designed. Besides, the more condemned criminals are left in prison cells without executing the death sentences passed on them, the more Nigerian judges will be unwilling to condemn more criminals whose criminal acts deserve capital sentence.
State governors who do not want to sign death warrants have the option of commuting the convictions to life imprisonment or even less. When governors refuse to sign the death warrant of condemned criminals and yet fail to commute their death sentences to terms of imprisonment, it amounts to negligence of duty and a deliberate refusal to exercise the powers conferred on them by the constitution. Keeping condemned persons in prison without deciding their fate only adds to the general problem of congestion which for many years has remained the most critical challenge confronting the NPS.
A prominent armed robbers’ hunter, Alhaji Ali Kwara, recently blamed state governors especially those who throughout their 8-year tenure in office refused to sign a single death warrant. Kwara said this was responsible for the increasing number of armed robbers and kidnappers in the country. Keeping condemned criminals inside prison cells without execution or commuttal to prison terms is a long standing problem of civilian governors. Military governors in this country were much less squeamish about signing death warrants. Governors must, as a matter of responsibility, expedite action in signing the order for the execution of prisoners on death row many of whom have spent several years, long enough to have earned them freedom if the death sentences had been commuted to prison terms. A death sentence commuted to prison term provides an opportunity for the convict to undergo rehabilitation that will make him a better and useful person in the society.
It becomes an act of injustice against condemned persons if governors refuse to sign their death warrant or commute same to prison terms. Their fate, after a judgment had been passed by a court of law, should not be allowed to hang in the balance. A decision must be taken to ensure that justice prevails.