The Senate, yesterday, joined other countries around the world to recommend the death penalty as punishment for the importation and exportation of hard drugs.

This also applies to manufacturing, trafficking, dealing in or delivery of the drugs by any means. The drugs specifically mentioned in a new bill passed by the Chief Whip of the Senate, Mohammed Ali Ndume, are cocaine and heroin, among others.

The bill is the National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) Act (Amendment) Bill, 2024. The maximum punishment in the extant law for offenders is life imprisonment. But, during the consideration of the report on the bill for passage, yesterday, Ndume recommended that the penalty should be “toughened” to the death penalty.

The penalty for drug importation or dealership is captured in Section 11 of the extant law, which Ndume sought to be increased to death sentence.