A Suicide Attempt Shouldn’t Land You In Prison – Ameh Zion

Maryam Aminu

Frustration in the land is affecting people’s mental health. With joblessness, poverty, hunger, insecurity, and uncaring governance prevalent, many Nigerians slip easily into depression, and some contemplate suicide.

Anyone who attempts suicide is crying for help. So, instead of throwing them in jail, and passing them through the criminal process, let us see that suicide attempt as a cry for help and use that as an intervention to give them the help that they need

The Founder Mandate Health Empowerment Initiative (MHEI)Mr Ameh Zion made this known during the 3rd in the series of mental health roundtable recently held in Abuja.

Zion added that the roundtable discussion is a call for collective advocacy, stakeholders efforts to decriminalise attempted suicide in Nigeria.

“Suicide is a major public health problem. Not only is each loss of life tragic in itself, but it also has profound and devastating effects on families and entire communities.

He expressed with displeasure that suicide and suicide attempts are criminalized in the laws of at least 23 countries worldwide and suicide attempts continue to be actively punished in some of them.

He added that criminalization of suicide perpetuates an environment that fosters blame towards people who attempt suicide and deters people from seeking timely help due to the fear of legal repercussions and stigma.”

While quoting the laws, which says
Section 327 of the criminal code states that “Any person who attempts to kill himself is guilty of a misdemeanour, and is liable to imprisonment for one year”.

Also, section 231 of the penal code states that “Whoever attempts to commit suicide and does any act towards the commission of such offence, shall be punished with imprisonment for a term which may extend to one year or with fine or with both”.He called on the country’s lawmakers to repeal laws that currently penalise citizens who try to take their lives with a one-year jail term.

Zion further called for promoting an environment where people feel able to seek help without stigma and shame.

He also expressed that responsible media coverage of suicide will be an important tool in our collective suicide prevention efforts. Adding that accurate, appropriate, and empathetic reporting on suicide, and encouraging people to seek vital help will help prevent suicide.

Speaking on the implementation of Mental Health ACT 2021, MHEI Boss said there is never a better time than now for collective multi sectoral approach to the full adoption and operationalization of the Mental Health ACT 2021 across all Nigerian States.

“Considering the claring increased demand and concerns around mental health conditions and needs across the country arrising from environmental, social economic and insecurity that has perpetually kept Nigerians on the edge of anxiety and uncertainty about life, there is need for all hands to be on deck to see that the ACT does not gather dust on shelves but and holistically operationalized” said Zion

He called on all stakeholders including Federal Ministry of Health under the leadership of the Hon. Minister Prof Ali Pate, National Primary Health Care Development Agency NPHCDA, Judiciary, States Executives, State Legislatives, other non state actors to be committed without ambiguity seeing that the ACT does not gather dust on shelves but and holistically operationalized for the mental well-being of Nigerians.

Speaking also, the project Coordinator, Mandate Health Empowerment Initiative, Mr Precious Anselm noted that around the world, hundreds of millions of people lack access to high-quality mental health services.

Anselm called for the integration of mental health in universal health coverage (UHC), under which people receive all essential health services

“There is need to develop health systems that deliver accessible cost-effective treatment available to all those who need it. For example under AMAC we only have one hospital(Karu General Hospital)which renders mental health services. So people from Gwagwalada, Kuje etc have to go all the way to Karu to receive treatment which shouldn’t be so.”