Farouk Lawan embraces Tinubu’s renewed hope after bribery conviction pardon, by Emmanuel Aziken

President Bola Ahmed Tinubu’s latest workout of the prerogative of mercy has stirred authorities and rule successful adjacent measure. In a sweeping determination endorsed by the National Council of State connected Thursday, October 9, the presidency announced “clemency to 82 inmates,” “reduction of situation presumption of 65 others,” commutation of 7 decease sentences to life, and posthumous pardons for nationalist figures including Herbert Macaulay and Mamman Vatsa.

Among the surviving beneficiaries was erstwhile House of Representatives subordinate Farouk Lawan—convicted successful the $3 cardinal bribery ungraded linked to the 2012 fuel-subsidy probe.

For Lawan, the pardon is not simply bureaucratic; it is existential. In a connection of gratitude, the erstwhile Kano lawmaker effusively said “To a fatherly, compassionate, and decisive governmental leader, His Excellency, President Bola Ahmed Tinubu, GCFR, God, and past shall retrieve you.” He added: “Mr President has formed a lukewarm broad implicit me, pulling maine backmost from the harshness of yesterday’s cold.” And, crucially for his nationalist re-entry: “My anticipation is renewed.”

Those 3 sentences—effusive, personal, and political—frame what comes next. Lawan’s condemnation past is simply a substance of record: connected January 26, 2024, the Supreme Court “affirmed the conviction… implicit the $3 cardinal bribery charge” and near successful spot the five-year word acceptable by the Court of Appeal.

Lawan was a towering fig successful Nigeria’s legislative procedures astatine the opening of the Fourth Republic. A erstwhile lecturer, helium easy transformed into 1 of the powerfulness mongers successful the House of Representatives and successful owed play helium adjacent acquired the enactment of The Integrity Group who pushed retired Patricia Etteh implicit unexecuted plans for location refurbishment.

He represented Bagwai/Shanono successful Kano, a authorities that volition beryllium a top-tier battleground successful 2027; it is nary wonderment his ain words linger connected “active citizenship with its unavoidable work imperative.”

 The Tinubu presidency, for its part, has supplied a wide nationalist rationale for the mercy list. The authoritative property merchandise explains that Lawan and 3 different named ex-convicts “were pardoned to alteration them to integrate into society, having demonstrated capable remorse.”

The aforesaid papers lays retired the administrative backbone: a 12-member Presidential Advisory Committee connected the Prerogative of Mercy (PACPM), chaired by the Attorney-General, whose study “was presented to the Council of State… arsenic required by the constitution.” The numbers were granular too: “A full of 175 beneficiaries are recommended,” covering inmates and ex-convicts, surviving and deceased.

Politically, the Lawan constituent of the determination volition beryllium work done the prism of Kano. After a decennary defined by the fuel-subsidy saga and the agelong arc of litigation that followed, Lawan is present a escaped governmental histrion telling Nigerians that “a re-dedication to the ideals of Nigeria is upon me.” Those successful Tinubu’s orbit who judge successful the powerfulness of symbolic reconciliations volition reason that specified statements tin soften edges successful a competitory bluish state. Yet the counter-argument is conscionable arsenic familiar—and conscionable arsenic quotable.

When President Muhammadu Buhari pardoned 2 erstwhile governors serving clip for corruption successful 2022, the Socio-Economic Rights and Accountability Project (SERAP) warned of the wide harm specified pardons tin bash to credibility. And besides to those who pb the prosecution of suspects.

In an unfastened letter, SERAP urged Buhari connected a reversal and to “use his ‘good offices to urgently reappraisal and retreat the pardon’”—and issued a durable caveat: “Impunity for corruption volition proceed arsenic agelong arsenic influential politicians flight justness for their crimes. The law powerfulness of prerogative of mercy ought not to beryllium an instrumentality of impunity.” Those lines, written astir a antithetic acceptable of beneficiaries nether a antithetic president, nevertheless encapsulate the disapproval each medication faces erstwhile clemency touches politically exposed persons.

Nor tin anyone assertion ambiguity astir Lawan’s judicial presumption earlier the pardon. The Supreme Court ruling ending his transgression entreaty was unambiguous arsenic it affirmed his condemnation implicit the $3 cardinal bribery charge.

 So, tin mercy construe into mileage for Tinubu successful Kano? Your analogous cannot supply an reply for now.

The presidency’s justification is the now-standard reintegration logic—”integrate into society, having...