The Nigerian Army has ratified the life jail slammed on 27 soldiers for staging a public protest in Akure, capital of South-west Ondo state, in 2008, but the sentences have been commuted to seven years imprisonment for each convicted soldier, army spokesman Brig.-Gen. Chris Olukola de said here Saturday.
The 27 soldiers, who previously served under the UN Mission in Liberia (UNMIL), were sentenced to life jail on 27 April 2009, after they were convicted over the public demonstration they staged in July 2008 to press for the payment of the backlog of their foreign allowances, which they claimed to be US$25,000 each .
Though the soldiers’ lawyers had vowed to appeal the life sentences, they recent ly claimed they could not yet file their appeal because they had not received the proceedings of the trial from the military court that tried the soldiers.