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Olugbemi. Adeyinka Ogunleye
3 days ago
Overview
Tinubu grants Herbert Macaulay, Mamman Vatsa, Ogoni 9, others pardon
A Nigerian founding father, Herbert Macaulay and a former FCT minister in the Babangida regime, Maj-Gen. Mamman Vatsa, are among Nigerians granted pardons on Thursday by President Bola Tinubu.
Kaduna State Governor, Uba Sani who briefed state House Correspondents in Abuja, said the National Council of States at its meeting on Thursday, approved President Bola Tinubu’s request for the granting of prerogative of mercy to 175 inmates to decongest correctional facilities across the nation.
He said of the 175 beneficiaries, 82 inmates were granted presidential pardon, 65 had their sentences reduced, and 7 death sentences were commuted to life imprisonment.
While Senator Sani did not disclose the names of the beneficiaries, he confirmed that the clemency exercise was carried out in line with the provisions of Section 175 of the 1999 Constitution (as amended), which empowers the President to grant pardons, reprieves, and commute sentences.
The PUNCH, however, while quoting a source, reports that Macaulay, Vasta, and members of the Ogoni 9 were granted posthumous pardons by Tinubu.
“Herbert Macaulay and Vatsa are among the two major ones on that list,” the source who attended the National Council of States meeting, according to the report, said.
Herbert Macaulay who lived from 14 November 1864 to 7 May 1946, is often referred to as the father of Nigerian nationalism. He was the founder and leader of the first political party in Nigeria, the Nigerian National Democratic Party (NNDP) and one of the earliest fighters for Nigerian independence.
Macaulay who was a civil engineer, a surveyor and a newspaper publisher, was controversially jailed twice by the colonial authorities. He was imprisoned in 2013 after being convicted for misappropriating funds from an estate he administered. In 1928, he was jailed six months with hard labour after his newspaper, Lagos Daily News (established in 1925) published an article deemed to be unfair to the Oba of Lagos. He was convicted of sedition.
Vasta on his own part, was executed by a firing squad on March 5, 1986, after he had been controversially convicted by a military tribunal over his alleged involvement in a coup to topple military President Ibrahim Babangida.
The Ogoni Nine, who were also reported to have been posthumously pardoned, were arrested by the Nigerian military government headed by Sani Abacha, and tried on charges of murder in a highly controversial trial widely condemned as unfair and politically motivated. They were executed by hanging on 10 November 1995. The most prominent among them was Ken Saro-Wiwa, who was a writer and an activist.
Credit: PM News
