Some Nigerian governors have rejected the calls by the trade unions that capital punishment be meted out to pubic official found guilty of corruption.
Nigerian governors
Labour said it was only by killing looters that the anti-corruption crusade being championed by President Muhammadu Buhari could succeed.
While the Ogun State Governor, Ibikunle Amosun, agitated that looters be sentenced to life imprisonment, rather than the death sentence prescribed by the organised labour, his Nasarawa state counterpart, Umaru Al-Makura, said he supported that capital punishment be meted out to corrupt public office holders.
“I really agree with the NLC over call for capital punishment for any public office holder who is found guilty of looting public funds,” Umaru Al-Makura told Punch.
However, governors of Ekiti, Plateau and Rivers states, Ayodele Fayose, Simon Lalong and Nyesom Wike rejected death penalty for looters.
“In all his discussions, Lalong has never mentioned death sentence. He has always preferred life imprisonment to taking human life because to him life is sacred,” Lalong’s Director of Press Affairs, Mr. Emmanuel Nanle said.
Speaking through his Chief Press Secretary, Mr. Idowu Adelusi, Fayose said jail sentence was better and capable of reforming thieves.
“In countries where death penalty was introduced, it has not stopped looting. In advanced countries like US, jail sentence is the penalty. What we need is proper moral education to change orientation of the people. Jail sentence is better; it can reform.”
On his part, Wike who equally spoke through his special adviser on media, Opunabo Inko-Tariah said; “Nigerians have a role to play by deriding looters and not to praise them for their fiscal irresponsibility. There should be a strong punitive measure to discourage looting because of its domino effects. When a treasury is looted, there won’t be money for the provision of necessities such as hospitals, roads, etc.
“Maybe because it happened in Ghana and the economy improved, the labour organisations want it in Nigeria. But that was a military regime and Jerry Rawlings was a military man. However, the extant laws on looting need serious and urgent review, even if the death penalty is discouraged.”
Meanwhile, the president’s advisory committee on corruption has said that no corrupt Nigerian will be spared in its anti-corruption crusade.
