The Advocates Sans Frontières (ASF) France, also known as Lawyers Without Borders, has revealed that 82 Nigerian women are currently on death row across various correctional centres.
The organisation described their situation as one of the most overlooked gendered injustices within the country’s criminal justice system.
Country Director of ASF France in Nigeria, Angela Uzoma-Iwuchukwu, disclosed this in Abuja on Wednesday during a two-day capacity-building workshop on Mainstreaming Gender Perspectives in the Use of the Death Penalty, held as part of activities marking the global 16 Days of Activism Against Gender-Based Violence.
Uzoma-Iwuchukwu said the number represents one of the highest female death-row populations in sub-Saharan Africa, yet the women remain largely neglected and forgotten because they are behind bars.
She explained that many female inmates end up on death row after reacting to years of abuse, but their circumstances are rarely considered during prosecution.
She argued that women face double punishment, first for the offence, and then for the mere fact of being women who dared to act.
Uzoma-Iwuchukwu said: ” A lot of these women are victims of domestic violence, and when they react and it leads to maybe homicide cases, the criminal justice system fails to recognise them as victims as they go through the justice system.
“And we argue that these women are, in fact, convicted and tried for more than their crimes. They are tried for more than the crimes that they have committed. They are tried for being women who dared to commit crimes. And this is the gender bias we see.
“There are several other issues that pertain to women, and we see that they are not in any way taken into account. Now, we see many of these women facing issues around poverty, cross-cutting issues that affect women.”
Uzoma-Iwuchukwu cited the case of a young woman in Katsina State sentenced to death by stoning under Sharia law after becoming pregnant outside wedlock.
She said ASF France intervened, and the Court of Appeal overturned the sentence.
“As capital defence lawyers know, the quality of legal representation can determine whether someone ends up on death row or not. Many of these women cannot pay for lawyers. Their socioeconomic status seals their fate,” she said.
She called for a moratorium on executions, insisting that courts must recognise gender-based violence as a mitigating factor during sentencing.
Executive Director of the Mothers and Marginalised Advocacy Centre (MAMA Centre), Dr. Chioma Kanu, warned that every inmate represents a chain of emotional and economic loss for families.
She stressed that wrongful convictions remain common.
Kanu said, “Not every death-row inmate is a criminal. Some were convicted on confessions obtained through torture.
Some have stayed in prison for decades because their case files disappeared. Others could not afford a lawyer. We can release an innocent prisoner, but we cannot wake the dead.”
Speaking, Founding Director, Equity Advocates, Ene Ede, argued that the continued exclusion of women from policymaking and governance deepens the discrimination they face within the criminal justice system.
According to her, laws and institutions tend to reflect the perspectives of those who design them, and when women are absent from these decision-making tables, their unique vulnerabilities remain unaddressed.
She said this structural imbalance helps explain why many women end up on death row without their lived realities being considered.
Ede commended the proposed special seats for women bill, saying it is a necessary corrective measure to strengthen female representation and ensure that gender-sensitive reforms are prioritised.
