THE CRIMINAL CODE ACT VIS-À-VIS THE PUNISHMENT – CRIMINAL LAW

 CRITICALLY ANALYZE THE CRIME PROVIDED UNDER THE CRIMINAL CODE ACT VIS-À-VIS THE PUNISHMENT – CRIMINAL LAW

I am going to critically analyze the crime provided under the Criminal Code Act vis-à-vis the punishment therewith with the view of ascertaining it’s propriety or otherwise. Due to lack of time and convenient purposes I have decided to pick Point the following crimes amongst others provided under the Criminal Code Act (C.C.A).

1.       Murder – section 315 & 316 C.C.A

2.       Rape – section 357

3.       Obtaining by false pretence – section 419

4.       Robbery and armed robbery – section 401, 402

5.       Stealing – 383, punishable under section 390

6.       Receiving stolen property – section 427

7.       Burials in houses without requisite consent:- section 246

8.       Written threats to murder – section 323

9.       Man slaughter – section 317 & punishable section 325

10.     Setting man-trap – section 342

          The above is not the totality of offences created by the Criminal Code Act (CCA) but it will serve as a Pont of contact to other numerous offences and their accompanying sanctions.

          However to make this work more easier and for clearity purposes I will have to sketch the offences in a table form then comment on the effectiveness or otherwise thereafter.

	SECTIONS OF C.C.A	OFFENCES	PUNISHMENTS
1.	Section 315, 316 & 319	Murder (unlawful killing)	Death sentence section 319
2.	357 & punishable under358	RAPE (unlawful carnal knowledge of a woman without her consent or with h.er consent if obtained by fraud, violent or threat of  violent	Section 358 life imprisonment
3.	418 and punishable under 419	Obtaining by false pretence	Section 419:- three years imprisonment.
4.	401, 402	Robbery and armed robbery! Stealing with violence or threat of violent before, during or immediately after the stealing and when with arms or ammunition	section 402 robbery: 21 years imprisonment armed robbery: Death sentence
5.	383	Stealing	Section 390: three years imprisonment
6.	427	Receiving Stolen Property	Life imprisonment if the property so received is got in the cause of felony
7.	246	Burial in houses without the requisite consent	Six months imprisonment
8.	323	Written threat to murd er	Seven years imprisonment
9	317 and punishable under 325	Manslaughter: unlawful killing of another in such circumstances as not to constitute murder.	Section 325: imprisonment for life.
10	342	Setting man-trap	Imprisonment for three years.

COMMENT:

The reason for creation of offence and its punishment is to regulate the society and the activities of men and any society without Law, more especially criminal law is like a jungle where big animal swallow the smaller ones. This is the reason for the advent of criminal law coming into force with its significant punishment. No wonder section 36(12) OF 1999 CONSTITUTION OF NIGERIA AS AMENDED provides that nobody can be punished for any offence unless it is expressly provided in a written legislation and its punishment expressly stated.                                                                      Permit me to say that the weight of any punishment for any offence depends on any of this factors:

1.       Its severity in the society

2.       Its prevalence in the society.

          Once the offence is deadly and highly criminal and if it is prevalent in the society a stiffer punishment is created to curb its menance.

Be that as it may and for the avoidance of doubt the offences identified above and its accompanying punishment is proportionate except No 7 above (Burial in houses) which has no iota of severity and its impossibility in the society. Upon acquisition of landed property you seek and obtain Governor’s consent but burial in the land without the Governor’s consent obtained have no criminal element at all calling it crime will be tantamount to calling renovating your apartment without governors consent crime and as such need to expunged from our criminal Law system because it have out lived its purpose in our criminal law system and hence have no criminal value in the society.

CONCLUSION

          In a nutshell due to the reasons adduced above all the offences and its antecedent punishment thereto is commesorate and have gone a long way to reduce crime rate in Nigeria society. If they are taken serious by the law enforcement agencies and of course the judiciary in seeing that they are adhered to the letter.

Since, the advent of capital punishment in terms of murder, kidnapping in some states like Delta State, arm robbery etc. Such crimes have been reduced to the barest minimum in the Nigeria Society.

 Before I drop my pen it is pertinent to state here that no matter how severe a punishment is to a crime it cannot stop it from being committed by a society so the essence of punishment is to reduce crime and not to eradicate nor expunge it in its entirety