Pardon. An act so seemingly innocuous it should never be controversial. Yet, recently, a state pardon provoked public opprobrium in Nigeria. Why? Because it was wrapped in crude politics and stripped of morality. Pardons are much like gifts: they have a deceptive innocence.
For instance, gifts are rooted in customs and tradition, but they are also associated with bribery and corruption. Similarly, a presidential pardon loses its moral anchor when it is steeped in impunity and abuse of power. So, it’s understandable why President Bola Tinubu’s recent decision to pardon 175 people, most convicted of serious crimes, triggered a spontaneous public outrage.
Of course, the president has the power, under section 175 of the 1999 Constitution, to grant state pardons. But while the pardoning power is discretionary, there are reasonable expectations that its exercise would not be arbitrary. State pardons should be governed not only by the principle of mercy but also the principles of fairness and justice. Furthermore, they should not be politically motivated but based on objective standards.
For instance, in granting a presidential pardon, due considerations should be given to the following factors. Has sufficient justice been done? Has the interest of the victim been duly served? Would the pardon have a negative impact on society at large in the sense of undermining societal values and public morality? And what impact would it have on a country’s international reputation? What message would the pardon send to the world about a country’s values and moral compass? Sadly, President Tinubu blatantly ignored these critical factors in granting his deeply controversial state pardons.
In his reaction, the renowned Human Rights lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN, called on the Federal Government to “withdraw and review the list of pardonees without any delay in the interest of justice and national morality.” His reason? “The list of pardonees includes convicted politically exposed persons, drug addicts and barons, armed robbers and terrorists, as well as persons convicted for contravening state offences like culpable homicide, murder, obtaining by false pretences.” In a tweet after the pardons were announced, StatiSense, an information services outfit, analysed the list of pardonees by crime categories, thus: drug-related convictions accounted for 29.2 per cent; unlawful mining, 24 per cent; homicide, 13.5 per cent; fraud/corruption, 12.3 per cent; hijacking, robbery, and human trafficking, 12 per cent. These are the kinds of crime for which a government should not signal condonement by rewarding convicts with pardons that undermine public morality.
But why did President Tinubu consider it appropriate to grant “full pardon” to drug barons, murderers, terrorists, human traffickers and those convicted of fraudulent and corrupt practices? If leniency was his motivation, he could have commuted their sentences instead of forgiving the crimes. There must be logic or rationality behind every state pardon so as not to undermine public confidence in the fairness and integrity of the criminal justice system. Alas, there was no logic, no rationality, no objective standard behind most of the pardons recently granted by President Tinubu.
Take the case of Maryam Sanda who was sentenced to death for killing her husband, Bilyaminu Bello, seven years ago. Instead of commuting her death sentence to life imprisonment or even a significantly long years in prison, President Tinubu granted her full pardon because she “had spent six years” in prison and showed “good conduct in jail”. Is six years in jail and good conduct a sufficient enough justice or punishment for killing her husband, thus meriting a full pardon? Little wonder the family of the late Bello described Sanda’s full presidential pardon as “the worst possible injustice any family could be made to go through.” The victim’s interest has not been duly served.
Well, we must return to the question: Why did Tinubu do it? One reason is that he enjoys exercising unfettered presidential powers. The Nigerian Constitution confers unconstrained powers on the president, and Tinubu has no qualms in exploiting the full panoply of those powers and even extending their boundaries. He condemned the unconstrained powers of the president while in opposition, but in power, akin to what the sociologist Robert Michels described as the “iron grip of oligarchy”, he is ruthlessly exercising those powers.
The second reason is, of course, political motivations. Tinubu is a calculative politician to the core and does everything with self-interested political calculations. In a State House statement announcing the presidential pardons, Bayo Onanuga, President Tinubu’s spokesperson, described the pardons as “President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s mercy”, suggesting that Tinubu owns the pardons as a personalised act, not as something done with wider considerations in mind. Surely, a president who grants state pardons as an act of personal mercy must hope that the citizens would view him as a compassionate leader, who cares for and about the people.
However, Nigerians did not see the presidential pardons in those terms; rather, they saw it as an act of impunity, an abuse of presidential powers. The reactions rattled the presidency, forcing the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi, to announce a review of the pardons. He reportedly ordered a multi-agency review and asked the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission, EFCC; the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency, NDLEA; and the police to do a “detailed review to ensure all names comply with legal and procedural standards.” But why was the Council of State asked to approve recommendations made by the Presidential Committee on Prerogative of Mercy, headed by the Attorney-General himself, when the pardonees had not been vetted to ensure they deserved clemency. Surely, that amounts to putting the cart before the horse, and the proposed review looks like an afterthought, a response to the widespread public outrage.
Yet, the presidency is speaking out of both sides of the mouth on the issue. While Fagbemi seemingly ordered a review of the of pardons, a presidential aide defended them. In an article titled “Much ado about a presidential pardon”, Tunde Rahman, President Tinubu’s senior media assistant, carpeted critics for misconstruing the “well-intentioned actions of the government”. But when well-intentioned actions turn morality and justice on their heads, they stop being well-intentioned; they become enablers of immorality and injustice, thereby eroding public trust.
To be sure, presidential pardons are typically and universally controversial. Then-President Goodluck Jonathan’s pardon, in 2013, of his former boss and political mentor, Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, former governor of Bayelsa, who was convicted of embezzling public funds, was controversial and widely condemned. Then-President Muhammadu Buhari’s pardon of Governors Joshua Dariye and Jolly Nyame, both convicted and jailed for corruption, in 2022 was deemed politically motivated and widely criticised. In the US, the presidential pardoning power is routinely abused, with presidents using their last days in office to grant pardons to convicted friends and relatives.
However, President Tinubu’s state pardon is particularly wrong-headed because, for a deeply corrupt, drug-infested and crime-ridden country, it reinforces Nigeria’s decadent moral values. The utter perversity of the presidential pardon is also reflected in the failure to separate the wheat from the chaff. Why, for goodness’ sake, would the foremost nationalist Herbert Macaulay be lumped together in a presidential pardon with drug barons and murderers. His family, led by Chief Bode George, was right to reject the posthumous state pardon; it was tasteless.
The Constitution rightly gives the president the power to grant state pardons. But the power should be used to strengthen public morality and justice, not to undermine them. Sadly, President Tinubu’s arbitrary and politically-motivated state pardons fail that test. An accountable and responsive government would revisit them!
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