Muritala Ayinla
Former President of the West African Bar Association (WABA) and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Femi Falana, Friday criticised President Muhammadu Buhari for granting state pardon to former governors Joshua Dariye and Jolly Nyame of Plateau and Taraba states respectively, who are serving terms in jail for corruption.
The Human Rights activist said that the president must, in the interest of fairness and justice, grant state pardons for other criminals and petty thieves, saying when the big ‘thieves’ are being released because they belong to the ruling party, common petty thieves who were jailed because of crimes committed due to hunger must also be set free.
The National Council of State had on Thursday granted state pardons to the former the governors who were serving terms in jail for corruption. The governors were among 159 prisoners pardoned by the Council at a meeting presided over by President Buhari at the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
Among those that benefited from the pardon are a former military general and minister in Sani Abacha’s regime, Tajudeen Olanrewaju, an army lieutenant colonel, Akiyode, who was an aide of former deputy to General Abacha, Oladipo Diya; and all the junior officers jailed over the 1990 abortive Gideon Orkar coup.
Nyame, 66, governor of Taraba State from 1999 to 2007, was serving a 12-year jail term at the Kuje Correctional Centre for misappropriation of funds while he was in office. The Supreme Court upheld his conviction in February 2020.
Dariye, 64, who governed Plateau State also between 1999 and 2007, was jailed for stealing N2 billion of public funds.
The former governor, elected as senator representing Plateau Central in the Senate in 2015, was sentenced in June 2018 but still completed his tenure from jail in June 2019.
But speaking at the First Anniversary of Comrade Yinka Odumakin Lecture and Book Presentation, which held in Lagos, Falana said that the injustice in the country must not be allowed to continue. He said if the governors could be released on the account of the state pardon, others too should be granted the same pardon in line with Section 17 of the1999 Constitution.
Falana said: “My reaction is that all criminals and petty thieves in our prison should be released. You know why? And under Section 17 of 1999 Constitution, there shall be equal rights for all citizens. And Section 42 says that there shall be no discrimination on the basis of class, gender and whatever. So you can’t take out two people on the basis that they belong to the ruling party. It is illegal. You took them out an left the rest there.”
He warned that if the government refused to release other criminals serving jail terms, he would instigate other lawyers whose clients were being detained or serving jail terms to approach the court to challenge what he described as “discriminatory treatment”.
