MP goes to jail

•Nigerian-born British lawmaker suffers what her Nigerian counterparts overcome with impunity

Reports that a British Member of Parliament (MP), Nigerian-born Fiona Onasanya, from Peterborough, has been jailed for three months, having been found guilty of perverting the course of justice by claiming someone else was driving her car on July 24, 2017 (just to avoid being ticketed for over-speeding) invokes a cocktail of emotions.

On the one hand is happiness that the law under the circumstance was allowed to take its course and just as the symbolic emblem of the justice that is blind to race, gender, status and creed, Ms Fiona has been made to face the law and get a requisite punishment despite her status.

On the other hand, there is a feeling of sadness that a member of the British Parliament, a solicitor and one who has lived so long in Britain and therefore expected to know and obey the laws can be so naive. The judge told her, “you have not simply let yourself down, you have let down those who look to you for inspiration, your party, your profession and parliament”. Ms. Onasanya, 35, belonged to the Labour Party and was elected in 2017.

Sadly too, the MP was sentenced alongside her 34-year-old brother, Festus Onasanya, who bagged 10 months in jail for two other offences in addition to the one under reference. The MP was sentenced to three months in jail but that opens the door to many other tragic losses in her political, personal and professional lives.

She has been expelled from the Labour Party, by implication; she is most likely to lose her seat at parliament even if she runs as an independent. She is most likely to lose her professional status as a solicitor. She will face public opprobrium for the rest of her life and will indelibly carry the tag of ‘ex-convict’.

It must be noted that transport laws, including speed limits when driving, are some of the measures countries put in place to ensure road safety and the protection of everyone. Britain has one of the most stringent traffic laws but an offence like over-speeding can attract, from mere warnings from traffic police, suspension/withdrawal of licenses, fines ranging from 25 – 75% of weekly income to thousands of pounds in fine and other penalties.

It is important to note here that Ms Onasanya was not jailed for a speeding offence per se but for perverting the course of justice by lying over two over-speeding incidents. She ought to have known and acted better.

Even though MP Onasanya’s story is a grace to grass one, it comes very instructively to a clime like her home country where justice and the law are often ‘respecters’ of persons, depending on their status. This is wrong. The law is originally meant to be no respecter of persons. The peasant and the king are supposed to be subject to the same laws and justice ought always to be done.

The level of impunity displayed by politicians and those in public offices without the requisite punishment is reason it appears that some people can break the law and not be prosecuted. No society grows without a strict adherence to the rule of law. Political office is supposed to be for service to the people, not a pedestal for impunity. Politicians and public office holders are supposed to, like Caesar’s wife, be above reproach.

Honesty is still a valued virtue in all individuals. An Onasanya might have just gone free by paying the ticket for over-speeding and saved herself the monumental disgrace that is her lot now. Pleading to retain her seat because she has no other job seems very familiar in a clime like Nigeria where most politicians have no visible means of livelihood, therefore making elections very flawed, desperate and expensive.

The British insistence on order and rule of law is what every society desirous of growth and development must adopt for a safer society. Nigeria at the moment has one of the highest accident rates in the world; we expect that those in authority can take a cue from Onasanya’s case; no road user should be above the law. The litany of government convoy accidents speaks to lawlessness in high places. We advise a review and strict implementation of our traffic laws.