Minister of Youth Development, Senator Akinlabi Olasunkanmi, has said immunity clause should not protect public officers against prosecution on criminal charges.
Speaking during an interview with journalists in Ode-Omu, Osun State, on Saturday, Akinlabi said immunity clause was a sensitive issue that should be handled with care, suggesting that the constitution should be amended to make it cover only civil cases.
�We tackled the issue in the last constitution review and what we said was that immunity from criminal issues should be removed while we should leave those of civil issues.
�Because I was part of that constitution review exercise, I still believe that we should remove immunity on issues of criminal nature and let it remain on civil cases so that people will not frivolously take our executives to court,� he said.
He added that politicians could hide under the immunity clause to distract government officials, but cautioned that chief executives who were accused of criminal charges should be made to face the music.
He also said constitutional review would be successfully done if aspects of the constitution that Nigerians have a unanimous opinion are amended before the controversial aspects are considered.
�We have so many items to be reviewed in the constitution; about 116. My advice to my colleagues is that we should look at those areas where we agree, where there is unanimity,� he said.