By Our Correspondent<\/p>\n
The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has condemned Senate President Godswill Akpabio\u2019s reported remarks on attempted suicide, describing his reference to \u201cseven virgins\u201d as a cynical and offensive comment that potentially promotes religious stereotyping.<\/p>\n
In a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, the party also described the Senate President\u2019s defence of imprisonment for suicide survivors as a disgraceful endorsement of what it called \u201can outdated colonial relic\u201d that preferred to punish citizens who ordinarily require help.<\/p>\n
While commenting on the National Suicide Prevention Bill at the Senate plenary on Tuesday, the Senate President had supported imprisonment as punishment for failed suicide attempts. In a video that went into circulation afterwards, Senator Akpabio could be heard saying, as he laughed, \u201cwhy death may be attractive to some young people is that they have seven virgins waiting for them.\u201d<\/p>\n
The opposition party has taken strong exception to the Senate President\u2019s remarks, describing it as “insensitive and disturbing.”<\/p>\n
\u201cWe find the lurid remark made by the Senate President, Senator Akpabio, about \u2018seven virgins\u2019 particularly insensitive and disturbing. We condemn it, not only because it promotes religious stereotyping, but also because it trivialises an issue that is, literally speaking, a matter of life and death,\u201d the ADC said.<\/p>\n
The party also declares its support for the position that suicide is a mental health issue rather than a criminal act.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe criminalisation of attempted suicide is a colonial legacy. These laws belong to an era when people experiencing profound distress were treated as offenders who, by trying to take their own lives, wanted to deprive \u2018the Crown\u2019 of the services they could render and the taxes they could pay, rather than as human beings in need of care.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is shameful that, when presented with an opportunity to reform this punitive inheritance, the head of the Senate chose to champion its preservation. Nigeria cannot continue to punish people for surviving a crisis that nearly claimed their lives, especially when those who handed us those laws have long abolished them,\u201d the party said.<\/p>\n
\u201cA position that leaves a suicidal person with only the choice of death or imprisonment does not discourage suicide. It encourages it. To suggest that anyone attempting suicide had better succeed would appear to encourage people to devise more effective means of taking their own lives. We don\u2019t think this is what the senators want.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By Our Correspondent The African Democratic Congress (ADC) has condemned Senate President Godswill Akpabio\u2019s reported remarks on attempted suicide, describing his reference to \u201cseven virgins\u201d as a cynical and offensive comment that potentially promotes religious stereotyping. In a statement issued by its National Publicity Secretary, Mallam Bolaji Abdullahi, the party also described the Senate President\u2019s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9056,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-18626","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18626","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=18626"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18626\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":18627,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/18626\/revisions\/18627"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9056"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=18626"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=18626"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=18626"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}