National Wire About Nigerians, Nigerian Business and Other Stories
Dayo Emmanuel
Nigerians have continued to agitate release of persons sentenced to death by military tribunals.
After 18 years of uninterrupted democracy, it is sad that some Nigerians who were sentenced to death by military tribunals of the 1980s and 1990s still languish in prisons nationwide.
Arthur Judah Angel is the Founder of Life Wire, an intervention organisation that sees to the release of persons illegally held behind bars.
His organisation which has seen the release of many inmates is also fighting the abrogation of death penalty.
“Death sentence has nothing to teach anybody and it is a retaliatory treatment and never a corrective measure, ” he told National Wire during an art exhibition he held at the Freedom Parks, Lagos recently.
According to Angel, several Nigerians who could have contributed to the country positively still waste away in condemned cells.
He brought a living example of Gabriel Inyang and Linus Iyeme who were attested in 1989 and later sentenced in 1995.
“GABRIEL INYANG AND LINUS IYEME CASE FILE NO: E/13 ART/1994. Date of arrest 11/10/89.
Date of conviction 14/DEC. 1995,” Angel quoted.
Continuing, the freedom fighter who was in prison between 1984 and 2000 for an offence the real perpetrator later came out to confess, added that, “These two guys have been in prison for 28 years. They were sentenced to death by the military tribunal then in Enugu. I have been in Enugu for their matter severally but the Prerogative Board kept demanding for their CTC of judgement which we can’t lay hands on.”
He added that “Linus is now paralysed in bit. I think their case is worthy of mention in ECOWAS court.”
