President Bola Tinubu has granted a presidential pardon to Maryam Sanda, who was sentenced to death in 2020 for killing her husband, Bilyaminu Bello, the son of a former Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) chairman.
Sanda, who had spent six years and eight months at the Suleja Medium Security Custodial Centre, was among 175 Nigerians and foreigners granted clemency by the President. The announcement was made on Saturday in a statement by Bayo Onanuga, Special Adviser to the President on Information and Strategy.
According to Onanuga, the decision followed the recommendations of the Presidential Advisory Committee on the Prerogative of Mercy, chaired by the Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi (SAN).
He explained that Sanda’s family had appealed for her release on humanitarian grounds, citing the welfare of her two children. The committee also noted her remorse, good conduct, and “commitment to rehabilitation,” describing her as a model inmate.
The pardon forms part of one of the most extensive clemency exercises in recent years, which also included posthumous pardons for late environmental activist Ken Saro-Wiwa, Major General Mamman Vatsa, and other members of the “Ogoni Nine.”
Sanda’s case captured national attention in January 2020 when Justice Yusuf Halilu of the FCT High Court in Abuja found her guilty of stabbing her husband to death during a domestic dispute. Delivering judgment, the judge ruled that “whoever kills in cold blood deserves death as his own reward.”
Her lawyers later filed a 20-ground appeal, alleging bias and seeking to overturn the conviction, but the Court of Appeal upheld both the verdict and the death sentence in December 2020.
Justice Stephen Adah, who delivered the appellate decision, said “the circumstances surrounding the death provide the clearest evidence of guilt.”
Although the police had prepared to defend the case at the Supreme Court, the presidential pardon has now brought the legal battle to an end.
The full pardon list released on Saturday featured six categories: full pardons, posthumous pardons, honoured victims, clemency grants, sentence reductions, and commutations of death sentences to life imprisonment.
