The death penalty in Nigeria is still fully legal and still being handed down by courts, but no one has actually been executed since 2016. Section 33 of the 1999 Constitution guarantees the right to life while carving out an exception for a court-ordered execution, and judges continue to sentence people to death for murder, armed robbery, treason, and a growing list of state offenses.1Nigerian Constitution. Chapter 4 Section 33 – Right to Life What has stopped is enforcement: governors almost never sign the warrants, and around 3,800 people now sit on death row waiting out sentences that may never be carried out.
What Crimes Carry a Death Sentence
Nigerian criminal law runs on parallel tracks. The Criminal Code Act applies in the southern states, the Penal Code Act applies in the north, and both prescribe death for murder.2European Union Agency for Asylum. Article 15a QD – Death Penalty or Execution Federal law adds treason and fabricating false evidence that leads to the execution of an innocent person, both carrying mandatory death sentences.3European Union Agency for Asylum. Country Guidance Nigeria – Individuals Accused of Crimes Treachery, which covers assisting an enemy during wartime, is also a mandatory capital offense under the Criminal Code.4Laws of the Federation of Nigeria. Criminal Code Act Armed robbery has carried the death penalty since the Robbery and Firearms Decree of 1984.
States have been expanding the list. At least eight have made kidnapping a capital offense, and a growing number have done the same for cultism, meaning organized membership in violent secret societies that operate in schools and communities.5Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide. Nigeria’s Debate on Death Penalty – Sign Execution Warrants or Impose a Moratorium Some states have added rape and certain terrorism offenses. The direction is only one way: more capital offenses, not fewer.
Twelve northern states apply Sharia penal codes to Muslim defendants, creating a separate category of capital offenses alongside the secular codes. Adultery by a married person and sodomy are punishable by death under these codes.6Human Rights Watch. Political Sharia – Human Rights and Islamic Law in Northern Nigeria Blasphemy also carries the death penalty in some states, and Kano State’s Sharia Penal Code specifically prescribes death for insulting the Prophet Muhammad.7European Union Agency for Asylum. Nigeria Country Focus – Blasphemy Laws These provisions apply only to Muslim defendants within the religious court system.
Methods of Execution
Four methods are prescribed in Nigerian law, though only two have been used in recent memory.
Hanging is the standard method under both the Criminal Code and the Penal Code for civilian convictions, and the last executions in 2016 were hangings at Benin Prison in Edo State for armed robbery.2European Union Agency for Asylum. Article 15a QD – Death Penalty or Execution Firing squad is typically associated with military tribunals or armed robbery convictions; in 2014, 54 soldiers were sentenced to death by firing squad after being convicted of conspiracy to commit mutiny. Lethal injection was added as a lawful method under the Administration of Criminal Justice Act of 2015 but has never actually been used.5Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide. Nigeria’s Debate on Death Penalty – Sign Execution Warrants or Impose a Moratorium
Stoning is prescribed under Sharia penal codes for offenses like adultery and sodomy, but no stoning sentence has ever been carried out. Lower Sharia courts have handed down these sentences, including the well-known cases of Safiya Husseini in Sokoto State and Amina Lawal in Katsina State, but higher appellate courts have consistently reversed them.6Human Rights Watch. Political Sharia – Human Rights and Islamic Law in Northern Nigeria In practice, stoning functions as a legal threat rather than an actual punishment.
Mandatory Sentencing and Why Judges Can’t Deviate
For the most common capital offenses — murder and armed robbery among them — a judge has no discretion once the verdict comes in. The death sentence is automatic. Nigerian mandatory sentencing laws don’t allow for weighing the severity of the crime, the defendant’s background, or any mitigating circumstances.5Cornell Center on the Death Penalty Worldwide. Nigeria’s Debate on Death Penalty – Sign Execution Warrants or Impose a Moratorium A conviction equals a death sentence.
The Supreme Court has upheld this framework. It has held that where a statute prescribes a mandatory sentence in clear terms, courts have no jurisdiction to impose anything less, and that the death penalty itself violates neither the right to life nor the right to human dignity under the Constitution, since Section 33 contemplates capital punishment as a lawful exception.
The practical effect is that courts keep adding to the death row population. New death sentences jumped from roughly 77 in 2022 to more than 246 in 2023, even as actual executions remained at zero. Judges who personally oppose the penalty have said publicly that the law gives them no room to do anything else.
Who Cannot Be Executed
Nigerian law shields people who committed their offenses as minors, though the age threshold depends on which statute applies. The Criminal Code sets the cutoff at seventeen: anyone the court believes had not reached that age at the time of the offense cannot be sentenced to death and is instead detained “at the pleasure of the Governor.”4Laws of the Federation of Nigeria. Criminal Code Act The Child Rights Act of 2003 defines a child as anyone under eighteen and bars the death penalty for a child.8Policy and Legal Advocacy Centre. Child’s Rights Act In states that have adopted the Act, the higher threshold applies. Not every state has, so the protection varies by location.
Pregnant women are treated differently depending on which law governs the case. The Criminal Procedure Act in the south and the Criminal Procedure Code in the north both require the court to substitute life imprisonment when a condemned woman is found to be pregnant. The Administration of Criminal Justice Act of 2015 takes a different route: it suspends the execution until the baby is delivered and weaned rather than commuting the sentence permanently. A woman sentenced under the ACJA could in theory face execution once her child is weaned, while one sentenced under the older state codes has her sentence permanently reduced.
Appeals and Executive Clemency
Anyone sentenced to death in Nigeria has a constitutional right to appeal. Sections 233 and 241 of the Constitution guarantee it, and cases typically move from the trial court to the Court of Appeal and, if necessary, to the Supreme Court. The process can take years, sometimes decades.
There is a hard limit, though. A defendant can challenge the underlying conviction by arguing innocence, procedural errors, or insufficient evidence, but the Supreme Court has held that appealing the sentence itself is pointless where the penalty is mandatory. If the conviction stands and the offense carries a mandatory death sentence, the appellate court cannot substitute a lighter penalty. The only remaining options are overturning the conviction or seeking executive clemency.
No execution can proceed without a formal death warrant signed by the relevant executive. Section 175 of the Constitution gives the President the power to grant pardons, stay executions, or commute death sentences for federal offenses, after consulting the Council of State.9Nigerian Constitution. Chapter 6 Part 1 Section 175 – Prerogative of Mercy Section 212 gives each state governor identical authority for state offenses.10Nigerian Constitution. Chapter 6 Part 2 Section 212 – Prerogative of Mercy A Presidential Advisory Committee on the Prerogative of Mercy visits correctional facilities, interviews inmates, and evaluates candidates based on factors like age, health, remorse, and reintegration potential.11The State House, Abuja. President Tinubu Signs Instrument of Clemency and Pardons In practice, clemency reaches only a fraction of condemned inmates.
Why No One Has Been Executed Since 2016
As of mid-2025, roughly 3,800 inmates are held on death row in Nigerian correctional facilities, around five percent of the total prison population. Many have waited ten, twenty, or thirty years without a final decision. The last executions were in 2016, when three people were hanged for armed robbery at Benin Prison, and executions were already rare before that.
The result is a de facto moratorium, though no official policy declares one. Governors hold sole authority to sign death warrants in their states, and nearly all of them decline. Some cite moral objections. Others avoid the political cost. Whatever the reason, sentences keep accumulating while executions do not.
Conditions on death row are harsh even by the standards of Nigerian prisons, which struggle with severe overcrowding and limited medical care. Prison officials typically treat condemned inmates as higher security risks, which translates into stricter conditions. Most facilities do not have dedicated death row wings. The Nigerian Correctional Service Act provides that inmates who have spent more than ten years on death row may have their sentences commuted, but the provision is not automatic and requires a case-by-case assessment of factors like behavior and age.
Getting a Lawyer in a Capital Case
The Constitution guarantees the right to legal assistance, and the Legal Aid Council provides free counsel to defendants who cannot afford private representation, including those charged with murder and armed robbery. The practical reality falls short. Legal aid resources are thin, caseloads are enormous, and many defendants facing the death penalty go through trial without meaningful representation. That gap contributes directly to wrongful convictions and to the size of the death row population. The quality of defense a person receives often comes down to geography and luck rather than any systematic guarantee.