THE ISSUE of Christmas presidential pardons has again cast a spotlight on Attorney-general Solon Nikitas, a man fast building a reputation as a stickler for the letter of the law.
The controversy arose when Nikitas sent back the President’s traditional list of inmates for pardon, arguing he wanted to go through the list on a case-by-case basis, taking into consideration the pros and cons of every single file.
The case was eventually resolved when President Tassos Papadopoulos returned a revised and shortened list, which was pushed through in time for Christmas.
Apart from exposing a huge rift between the Attorney-general and his deputy (and indeed most of the political establishment), the pardons debate has again called into question Nikitas’ reading of the law. This is the man who insisted debtors should be jailed, not given suspended sentences as had been past practice. Now he opposes the traditional early Christmas release traditionally given by the president, and this at a time when our prisons are seriously overcrowded.
Then again, an Attorney-general is not there to please the gallery. He is not a politician facing re-election; he is the ultimate arbiter of the law, and politicians must tread carefully in their criticism, lest they appear to undermine the necessary independence of his office.
And the Attorney-general does have a point, though he did not take the argument to its full conclusion: there is something fundamentally wrong with a system of presidential pardons.
Yes, Nikitas did appear the Scrooge, questioning pardons for foreigners on immigration offences (who in any case should simply be deported, not jailed) or non-violent convicts who had mere days left on their sentences. But he is right that there should be a more rigorous system within the framework of the law.
What he did not argue, and what his critics failed to mention, is that this whole case has highlighted the need for the creation of a parole board, a proper system that would co-ordinate with the Justice Ministry, the Attorney-general’s office and the prison authorities to assess inmates’ eligibility for early release.
In this way, convicts would be treated case by case, as the Attorney-general demands, their files would be carefully examined, and their suitability for release properly established on an individual basis and after consultation with all relevant authorities.
The current system is simply arcane, reinforcing a perception of the President as a dispenser of patronage. Of course, the current list is drawn up by the Justice Ministry in consultation with the central prisons and passed on to the President. But the impression remains of an all-powerful benign President bypassing the legal system to dish out pardons from on high.
President Papadopoulos has said he wishes to eliminate all forms of nepotism from government and public administration. No one is suggesting that nepotism plays any part in drawing up the list of prisoners for early release, but the current system feeds an outdated image of the President’s role.
So set the wheels into motion to set up a parole board. It would answer the Attorney-general’s concerns, it would better serve both the inmates and the public by providing a full and systematic screening of convicts, and it would mark a step towards establishing a modern, professional, European administration, marked by the rule of law rather than the dispensing of patronage.
