The Federal Government’s move to decriminalise attempted suicide is a necessary break with a punitive past. But removing the threat of prosecution is only the beginning. Nigeria must now build the crisis care, treatment, follow-up, financing and data systems that a person in suicidal distress actually needs.
On August 19, 2026, Nigeria took a significant step towards treating attempted suicide as a public-health crisis rather than a criminal offence. The Federal Executive Council approved a proposed amendment to decriminalise attempted suicide, a move that is both necessary and long overdue. But the approval is not yet the law. More importantly, it raises a harder question: what does Nigeria intend to put between a suicidal person and their next attempt?
The proposed reform still has to pass through the National Assembly. That makes this more than a legislative milestone. It is an opportunity to decide what should replace a system that has punished people in crisis. Removing the threat of prosecution is only the beginning. The real test will be whether, after the law changes, a person who survives a suicide attempt finds something better waiting for them than a police cell.
In Nigeria, surviving a suicide attempt has not always meant that the worst was over. Sometimes, it meant being taken into police custody.
In 2019, CNN reported the story of Ifeanyi Ugokwe, a 25-year-old man who said he was hungry, jobless, and exhausted from searching for work. He jumped into a lagoon after a humiliating encounter while looking for employment. Fishermen rescued him. He said he was then handed over to the police and imprisoned for attempting to take his own life.
That story is old enough to have been forgotten, but the law is not. Under Section 327 of Nigeria’s Criminal Code, a person who attempts to kill themselves commits a misdemeanour punishable by up to one year in prison. Section 231 of the Penal Code contains a corresponding offence.
As Prof. Cheluchi Onyemelukwe, Chair of the National Task Force on the Decriminalisation of Attempted Suicide, has argued, this approach is deeply flawed. She has described Nigeria’s punitive suicide laws as a “legacy of the colonial era” that has no place in modern psychiatric and public health solutions.
Also Read: Nigeria Mental Health Act: All You Need To Know Right Now
Beyond The Law: Addressing Nigeria’s Material Realities
But what happens when we remove the punishment? If the answer is simply “nothing”, then we have changed the law without changing the life of the person it was supposed to protect. A person can be taken out of immediate danger and still return to the conditions that made life feel unbearable.
That is particularly important in Nigeria, where psychological distress does not exist separately from material realities. Poverty, unemployment, food insecurity, displacement, insecurity, homelessness, academic pressure, relationship breakdown and domestic violence can all become part of the circumstances in which a person begins to feel that they cannot continue.
If someone is depressed, they may need a psychiatrist. If they are experiencing a psychiatric emergency, they may need urgent medical care. But if they have nowhere to sleep, cannot afford food, are trapped in an abusive home, are survivors of sexual violence, have lost their livelihood or are facing a crisis they cannot see a way out of, those realities matter too.
Mental health care cannot substitute for social protection. Social intervention cannot substitute for mental health care. Nigeria needs both.
This is why suicide prevention cannot begin only at the point of an attempted suicide. It has to begin much earlier: in schools where young people can learn how to recognise distress and seek help; in primary healthcare centres where mental health problems can be identified; in communities where asking for psychological help is not treated as weakness; and in families where someone can say “I am not okay” without being met with shame.
Beyond Attempted Suicide: Bridging The Gap Between Policy and Practice
It also has to exist at the level of government. Nigeria already has much of the policy language required. The country has a National Mental Health Act, a National Mental Health Policy and a National Suicide Prevention Strategic Framework. The Federal Government has also established a task force on the decriminalisation of attempted suicide.
The problem is increasingly not that Nigeria does not know what should be done. It is whether the systems required to do it will actually exist. A policy can recommend crisis intervention. It cannot answer a telephone at 2 a.m.
A law can create a right to mental health care. It cannot, by itself, put a psychiatrist in a community where there is none. And a referral is not care if there is nowhere to refer the person. This matters because Nigeria’s mental-health system remains severely stretched. Treatment is often paid for out of pocket, while the country has far fewer mental-health professionals than its population requires.
Decriminalisation without investment in accessible care risks creating a compassionate law on paper and a space in practice. Police also play a role. Police officers will continue to encounter people in acute suicidal distress, whether at home, in public spaces or during emergencies.
Decriminalisation should therefore be accompanied by clear protocols and training for first responders: how to keep someone safe, how to communicate without humiliation, when to involve health professionals and where to refer them. The police cannot become Nigeria’s mental-health system by default, but they can become part of a system that knows what to do.
We also need to know whether the system is working.
Nigeria’s suicide data is limited, and attempted suicide is even harder to measure. Stigma, concealment and inconsistent reporting mean that many people who survive an attempt may never appear in official statistics. Without reliable data, it becomes difficult to know who is most at risk, where services are failing or whether interventions are actually preventing future crises.
Also Read: Suicide Prevention in Africa: What We Need To Talk About
Conclusion
That is why the success of this reform should not be measured simply by whether criminal provision disappears from the statute book. It should be measured by what happens to the next Nigerian who survives an attempted suicide. Are they treated with dignity? Can they access care? Does anyone follow up after the immediate danger has passed? If the answer to those questions is no, then what exactly have we changed?
Nigeria has changed the question around suicide from “What punishment should a person who attempts suicide receive?” to “What care does this person need?” Now we have to be prepared to answer it because decriminalisation is not the end of suicide prevention. It is the point at which Nigeria can finally begin to build it.
If you or someone you know is suicidal, or is in immediate danger, please call the emergency number.
- Nigeria Emergency Hotline: 112
- Nigerian Suicide Prevention Initiative Counselling Centre: +234 806 210 6493
You can also check our mental health service providers directory if you need mental health support.
Author: Bello Grace Adeola is a medical student, mental health advocate, and writer. She is the founder of a youth mental health advocacy community, F.A.I.T.H., and a boy-child mentorship initiative, the Project ROOTED mentorship initiative.
