Legal practitioners have faulted the Unlawful Societies and Cultism (Prohibition) Bill 2020 seeking to punish parents for their children’s involvement in cultism.

On Monday, the Lagos State House of Assembly passed the bill during a plenary session through a voice vote conducted by the Speaker, Mudashiru Obasa.

Speaking separately with Peoples Gazette, the lawyers stated that the bill was against the provision of the country’s constitution.

“The bill is against the provision of section 4 of Nigeria’s constitution. If assented by the Lagos state governor, there will be a lot of opposition to it,” Okenna Nnebedum said.

Mr. Nnebedum held that it was wrong to punish one person for another’s crimes regardless of the person’s position except it is a case of conspiracy.

He argued that the criminal code of the South and the North’s penal code had already made provisions for punishment of individuals involved in cultism, adding, “A bill that goes against any section of the constitution will not stand.”

In a similar vein, Festus Ogun, a legal practitioner pointed out that punishing parents for their children’s crimes was unlawful.

Mr. Ogun, said, “It is an aberration for any police officer or any security agencies whatsoever, to arrest a person in suspicion of another.”

According to him, section 7 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015 “explicitly provides” that it is wrong to arrest a person in place of a suspect.

“Even section 4 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law of Lagos state made it abundantly clear that you cannot arrest a person in place of a suspect. If you now go ahead and say you want to arrest the parent of a child in place of that child you are definitely breaching the law,” Ogun asserted.

Mr. Ogun explained that the bill would breach section 35 of the country’s constitution, which gives everyone, parent or child, the right to liberty.

Citing a court of appeal’s verdict in a case between ACB vs Okwonkwo in 1997, the lawyer said, “The court had made it clear that you cannot arrest a person in place of another. It does not happen in a democratic society; it does not fit with the spirit and letters of our laws so that law cannot stand the test of constitutional and legal validity.”

He advised the state government to have adequate measures to ensure suspects are arrested and not their parents.

Adesina Ogunlana, a former chairman of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Ikeja, said, “I don’t want to believe that. Under what circumstances? What are the situations? But it will be funny to say that parents will be punished.”

Meanwhile, the speaker has asked the acting Clerk of the parliament, Olalekan Onafeko, to send the bill to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu for his assent.