PUBLIC activism is often dismissed as noise, hashtags that flare and fade, marches that make the evening news and then dissolve. But when citizens stay with the work beyond the first spark, activism becomes a disciplined insistence that power answer to justice. Nigeria’s recent reversal and revision of the controversial presidential pardon list proved this.
It showed that when people refuse to be bystanders, institutions can be nudged back toward the public interest, and discretion can be guided by reason, compassion, and security in equal measure. It also showed something subtler: that the legitimacy of mercy grows when it is bounded by rules, transparent criteria, and the voices of those who bear the consequences of crime.
This moment did not arrive in a vacuum. It unfolded in the broader ecosystem where the costs of apathy are steep: a tightening fiscal noose as debt servicing crowds out investment in classrooms, clinics, and roads; a development story too often written in ambitious budgets but erased by weak implementation; a governance culture where corruption tries to pass as cleverness and short-term optics imitate progress. In such a climate, activism is not an indulgence.
It is the civic scaffolding that keeps a democracy from sagging under its own contradictions. When public money is borrowed, citizens must ask to what end; when projects are announced, citizens must return to the site months later to see if concrete followed ceremony; when leaders invoke mercy, citizens must inquire about the criteria, consultation, and the moral balance between the accused, the victim, and society.
Clemency exists for good reasons to correct miscarriages of justice, to temper penalties with humanity, to affirm that the law’s purpose is not only to punish but also to reform and redeem. Yet mercy detached from public safety, from the rights of victims, and from the morale of those who enforce the law becomes sentimentality masquerading as justice.
When an initial pardon list included persons convicted of serious crimes—kidnapping, drug offences, human trafficking, fraud, unlawful possession of firearms—the country pushed back. The questions were precise and disciplined rather than merely loud: Who was consulted? What legal and security standards were applied? How do we honour the three-way traffic of justice—the accused, the victim, and society—without collapsing one into the other? How does clemency interact with deterrence, especially in a context of rising insecurity and a drug-use crisis that damages families and futures?
The response, after sustained pressure, was a course correction. Names tied to serious crimes were removed. Some full pardons became commutations. A death sentence that shocked the conscience of many was reduced in light of compassionate grounds and the welfare of children, not as a blank cheque but as a calibrated choice framed by remorse and good conduct.
Beyond the list itself, the process shifted: the committee secretariat moved to the Justice Ministry, where legal rigour is native rather than auxiliary; more straightforward guidelines were ordered; prosecuting agencies were placed inside the consultation loop; the language of “three-way justice” surfaced in official explanation; the need to protect enforcement morale and meet bilateral obligations was affirmed. Imperfect, yes. But unmistakably a signal: the public voice can refine executive power, and the exercise of mercy can be strengthened by transparency rather than weakened by it.
What made the difference was not simply outrage. It was the quality of the argument and the breadth of the coalition. Victims’ advocates invoked dignity and deterrence without weaponising grief. Legal communities brought constitutional literacy, comparative practice, and a sober account of Section 175 of the Constitution. Journalists and civic groups supplied facts, timelines, and careful framing; they did not merely recirculate anger, they curated understanding.
Faith and traditional leaders added moral ballast without stoking vengeance. Online energy did not simply trend; it travelled into petitions, op-eds, radio panels, town halls, and back-channel engagement. Activism worked because it was more orchestra than solo, more evidence than echo, more persistence than performance. It found the narrow path between indifference and excess, refusing both apathy’s shrug and mob justice’s roar.
The lesson travels. The same civic muscle that helped repair a clemency process can bend other stubborn arcs. On debt, citizens can insist that every loan carry a public purpose test, published terms, delivery milestones, and independent audits that arrive on time and in full. A living debt dashboard can display maturity profiles, interest types, currency exposures, and the project pipeline for each borrowing.
Parliament’s oversight can be fertilised by civil society’s shadow reports and citizens’ testimony from project sites. Borrowing should not be a midnight ritual of technocracy but a daytime conversation about trade-offs, with numbers the public can read and timelines communities can verify. Mercy now has guidelines; borrowing should, too.
On corruption, open contracting and real-time procurement portals can turn sunlight into disinfectant. It is harder to pad a bill when the bill is public in machine-readable formats, the bids are timestamped, and any undergraduate can compare price histories across ministries with a spreadsheet. Whistleblowers should be protected not with speeches but with budget lines, legal guarantees, and swift penalties for retaliation.
Attention must be focused on the most prominent risk theatres—extractives, defence procurement, extensive infrastructure, so scrutiny matches scale. In each sector, a citizen playbook can specify red flags, provide a simple checklist for due diligence, and list the locations where documents must exist if a contract is genuine. When evidence is standardised, outrage becomes useful.
On budget implementation, a citizens’ budget written in plain language can be paired with quarterly execution scorecards that show not only how much was released but what changed on the ground. Communities can geo-tag project sites and upload photo evidence, collapsing the distance between appropriation and reality. Local radio can host “budget hours” where project managers answer practical questions: when will the borehole produce water, how many desks have arrived, and who signed off on the change order that increased the cost by 30%. Legislatures can institutionalise public hearings that listen to facts, not folklore, insisting that budget debates are not theatre but a forum for proof.
There are risks to watch out for. Activism can slide to punitive populism, punishing people unfairly and stopping careful judgment. Leaders might act tough to avoid criticism rather than be fair and just. Groups can break apart due to pride and fatigue. Bad actors might join in, turning a citizens’ movement into a tool of politics. The solution is not silence but better participation: use facts, accept complexity, protect fair processes even when angry, and follow rules for protests and communication to stay respectful. Mercy will still be needed—maybe for someone who has truly changed or for a punishment that was too harsh. The goal isn’t to reject mercy but to apply it wisely with clear reasons and fairness, giving victims a chance to be heard.
What does “better” look like? The picture is not distant. A clear clemency process, with public rules, reasons recorded, victims’ views considered, security checks done, and input from prosecutors. Summaries are shared without breaking privacy. A debt system where borrowing is allowed only with an apparent, published reason, linked to a project, a timeline, and a real audit afterwards.
A budget process where reporters and citizens follow how money is spent as closely as they debate plans, and lawmakers listen to facts based on data, not just formal talks. None of this is utopian; in fact, they are realistic. We have already started this with the clemency review by creating a secretariat, making guidelines, and adding consultations where decisions used to be secret.
People are at the heart of every policy discussion. There is a widow afraid that mercy might make her loss seem less real. A young officer worries that one signature could lead to his arrest. A prisoner who has changed hopes the state sees rehabilitation as a good, not a failure. A child needs a classroom, not to be just a number in the country’s debt-to-GDP ratio. Activism is strongest when it remembers these are real lives, not just symbols, and holds policies responsible to people, not just ideas.
A democracy grows stronger as its citizens grow wiser and participate actively. Instead of getting angry, we should watch closely and participate in public decision-making. The clemency change is a reminder that good government happens not by chance but through steady, informed and persistent effort. We can’t achieve greatness, justice, or change by shortcuts; it takes a watchful public to guide leaders who make decisions. Now, we must make this public activism and careful attention a regular, everyday practice that everyone shares.
We keep going, not because activism is fun, but because it’s needed. The government is not the enemy, but power needs checks to stay honest. We send freedom of information requests even if we get no reply at first. We take pictures of the roadwork every week until the road is done. We go to meetings, take notes, share what we learn, and invite those who disagree to discuss it in good faith.
We teach young people how to understand budgets and respect both mercy and consequences. The lesson is simple: rage in an appropriate dose can start change, but only careful watching keeps change going. If we can change how we act, how our systems work, and what we expect, this moment will be more than news. It will be a turning point. The country that makes this change will be stronger, fairer, and truer to itself.
- Dr Dakuku Peterside is the author of bestsellers, Leading in a Storm and Beneath the Surface. His syndicated column appears on News Point Nigeria newspaper on Monday.