By Joy Essien, Contributing Editor
Out of the 175 people pardoned by President Tinubu, 53 are drug dealers and by drug I mean tramadol, cocaine, Indian hemp, marijuana, cannabis, heroin. 41 out of this same 175 pardoned people were illegal miners.
Throw in Herbert Macaulay, Ken Saro Wiwa and Mamman Vatsa to the mix to give it a face-lift and we have a presidential pardon with 53.71% of it’s total pardons drug dealers and illegal miners.
But this isn’t the most shocking part, one case of murder has sparked outrage and questions the essence or motive behind this strange list.
Maryam Sanda who was convicted and given the death sentence by a reputable court of law for stabbing her husband to death has also been pardoned!
Unless her husband’s family were the ones to request for clemency on her behalf, this is all shades of wrong and leaves one confused and gobsmacked all at once.
Pardoning Ms. Sanda undermines the intrinsic value of human life.
There is a moral backbone to acts like clemency. And the way I understand how these things work, clemency rides on the back of justice. This way, the whole thing isn’t reckless and compromising the ideals of equity and fairness. Mercy can also be extended, speedily, when a person has been found to be innocent or wrongfully accused of a crime or committed a crime unintentionally.
These persons should also have served a considerable amount of time in jail but some have barely served 2 years. Drug enforcement agencies have gone through so much to prosecute and secure convictions for drug offenders and this move by the President makes a mockery of these efforts. And also a mockery of the criminal justice system and questions the values this government upholds.
It is alleged that President Tinubu granted clemency to most of them based on the reports that the convicts had shown remorse and good conduct. Others were forgiven based on old age, vocational skills acquisition or enrollment in the National Open University. Going by these basis, it would seem all it takes to get clemency is to show remorse and acquire vocational skills. Perhaps we need to be reminded that Nigeria is still regarded as a major transit point for illicit drugs even as we are currently burdened by a pandemic of drug use by the youths.
The whole thing spells one thing, though. A system that denies justice.
