Capital punishment in Nigeria

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Capital punishment is a legal penalty in Nigeria.

Methods of executions include hanging and shooting and capital crimes include murder, terrorism-related offenses, rape, robbery, kidnapping, sodomy, homosexuality, blasphemy, adultery, incest, assisting the suicide of a person legally unable to consent, perjury in a capital case causing wrongful execution, treason, some military offences like mutiny and practice of indigenous beliefs in states applying Shariah law.

No executions took place between 2006 and 2013. In 2013, four prisoners on death row were hanged. About a thousand prisoners were awaiting execution at the time. After that, there were no more executions until 2016, when Nigeria carried out three executions.

On 17 December 2014, after being found guilty of conspiracy to commit mutiny, 54 Nigerian soldiers were sentenced to death by firing squad. The trial was held secretly by a military tribunal.

The use of the death penalty in Nigeria has generated varied opinions among people in society. In October 2014, former Governor of Delta State Emmanuel Uduaghan pardoned three inmates who were on death row following the recommendations by the State Advisory Council on Prerogative of Mercy. In 2017, the Nigerian government has rejected the call by Amnesty International to halt the planned execution of some inmates on death row in Lagos State, and pointed that the death penalty was expressly authorized by section 33 of the Constitution of Nigeria.