NAN-H-47
Kidnapping
By Lydia Ngwakwe
Lagos, Oct. 26, 2016 (NAN) Some rights activists in Lagos on Wednesday gave support for a bill proposed by the Lagos State House Assembly recommending death by hanging for convicted kidnappers.
They told the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) that death penalty had curtailed crime in some countries and would reduce kidnapping in the state.
The state assembly had last week, during a public hearing, recommended the death penalty.
The public hearing was on a bill sponsored by the Speaker Mudashiru Obasa.
The bill seeks to provide for prohibition of kidnapping and related matters.
It states that any person, who kidnaps, abducts, details, captures or takes another person by any means with the intent to demand ransom or do anything against his/her will, commits an offence, and is liable on conviction to death sentence.
The Lagos State Chairman of the Civil Liberty Organisation, Mr Ehi Omokhuale, told NAN that death penalty was working for most western nations.
“ I fully support death penalty for kidnappers because the crime, kidnapping, has become a cankerworm in our system. Death penalty will help to reduce the menace.
“Death penalty is helping to clean Malaysia’s image,’’ Omokhuale said.
The Lagos State Chairman of Inter-Party Advisory Council, Mr Ajayi Kola, also hailed the lawmakers’ recommendation.
Kola told NAN that no punishment would be too heavy for kidnapping.
“When you look at the havoc, the pain and agony kidnappers put on the relatives of their victims, then, anything more than death sentence should be recommended.
“The maltreatment, humiliation etc is enough to kill whoever is kidnapped; so, I support the death sentence. Perhaps that will reduce the rate of kidnapping.
“When people know the danger in it, they will not want to venture into such an act,’’ Kola said.
However, Prince Toyin Raheem, a member Action Team Against Conscription and Kidnap (ATACK), condemned the lawmakers’ recommendation.
In a statement he issued in Lagos, Raheem said that capital punishment might not eliminate kidnapping.
He said that imprisonment and re-orientation of convicted kidnappers would be a better alternative.
“Armed robbery attracts death penalty in Nigeria, but has it reduced armed robbery? Death penalty is not the solution.
“Death sentence is no longer in vogue; many countries are already removing it from their statutory books.
“The Nigerian system that breeds criminality has to be discarded; a system where government does not spend massively on social amenities is bad.
“Lack of employment opportunities, education being a privilege and not a right, can only coerce people into crime.
“Desperation to survive leads people into kidnapping and other vices,’’ the ATACK member said.
He urged governments to provide work, affordable accommodation and abundant food for the citizens.
Raheem called on governments to provide welfare and security, adding that adequate security would make kidnapping difficult.
NAN reports that the current Lagos State Criminal Code provides for 21 years imprisonment for kidnapping. (NAN)
LED/IGO
========
(Edited by Ijeoma Popoola)