No prisoners’ exchange for Nigerians on death row abroad – FG

by Azeez Adeniyi

The Minister of Foreign Affairs, Geoffrey Onyeama on Wednesday said the Nigerians on death row in other countries abroad cannot be repatriated home through the Prisoners Exchange Programme.

Onyeama said capital offenders did not fall within the prisoners’ exchange programme.

A Human Rights organisation, Legal Defence and Assistance Project had called on the Federal Government to fight for Nigerians on death row in foreign countries.

The organisation stated that no fewer than 300 Nigerians were currently on death row in prisons across Asian countries since 2016.

Onyeama, however, said, “Each country has its laws and each country is sovereign. So, we do not have any leverage in terms of influencing the laws of countries and the implementation of those laws’’.

“With respect to the death row, in cases where Nigerians have been sentenced to death, we have always intervened to ask for commutation of the death sentence.

“You can have agreements where you can have prisoners exchanges or you can have some mechanisms for after a prisoner has served a certain amount of their sentence.

“They could come back to their country to serve the rest.”

He added, “There are bilateral agreements that we have with some countries and certainly we do try in those countries to persuade them to send these prisoners back.

“But a lot of them are there for capital offences.

“And very often, it will be impossible for capital offences, unless they are commuted to life sentences to get those countries to agree to send those prisoners back,” he said.

He advised that Nigerians should be sensitized on the risks of getting involved in trafficking.

“You go to countries where you know that drug trafficking is a capital offence, you are literally taking your life in your own hands.

“We will keep trying to get the message across, but we know that there are some people who are willing to take the risks because some people make it and they see that the rewards are impressive.

“We of course also have to work on education in our countries and providing the enabling environment for people not to need to take those extreme risks,” he said.

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