Deborah, Christianah? Investigating Blasphemy killings In Northern Nigeria (PART 2)

Blasphemy Killing In Gombe

A similar case of killing in the name of blasphemy THE WHISTLER investigated was the case of the late Christiana Oluwatoyin Oluwasesin, a Christian teacher killed at Government Day Secondary School (GDSS), Gandu, Gombe. The mother of two, who hailed from Ekiti State, was reportedly murdered by a mob on March 21, 2007, for allegedly insulting Islam.

The only eyewitnesses to the incident still available were Christiana’s colleagues in the school but were unwilling to open up for fear of being targeted. But THE WHISTLER spoke to members of her church who gave their own account of what happened.

Rev Abraham Akanmu Olanrewaju, presiding pastor of Manna Evangel Faith Assembly in Gombe, gave an account of the incident:

“She was teaching in Gandu. She also served there and the state government retained her as a Science Teacher and she was doing very well, but this fateful day in March, all of a sudden we heard that there was a riot in town and a Christian lady was killed.

“Meanwhile, she usually keeps her baby in daycare somewhere around the school where the Muslim women used to help take care of them.

“So, when the incident happened, the whole city was in turmoil, the news we heard was that she was actually invigilating exams and that would be her last time in the school. So, this invigilation led her to the unfortunate event. The female student planted some Qur’an or just some Arabic books among the exam scripts, and normally you don’t carry exhibits to the exams, but sometimes they dare you and see what you’ll want to do.

“They burnt down about 3 classroom blocks and the school clinic, the administrative block and the library, before burning her to death after Killing her just the way they did to Deborah. They poured petrol and burnt her.

“The killers started looking for Christiana’s husband, but the man had traveled. It was later they retrieved her little son from the Muslim woman. The woman used her hijab to conceal the baby. When she heard that the father worked in the hospital, she brought him to the hospital and they (the hospital staff) took the boy to the house.”

Late Christiana’s neighbour at the Specialist Hospital Quarters, Gombe, who refused to give her name, also gave an insight into her death.

She said, “During the course of supervision, they mounted a booklet in the Qur’an, so she asked why they would do that, and asked them to remove it. Then she removed the booklet. It was when she removed it that they started shouting that she had torn the Qur’an.

“At that moment that thing happened, as she was coming out of the exam hall, the school was already surrounded.

“She had two children, so it was the smallest that she was still nursing and left at daycare that day. In the process of entering the daycare to pick up her child, it was then that people rushed at her.”

Rev Olanrewaju and Christiana’s neighbour both argued the murder was premeditated. Her death enraged the Gombe Christian community, and the Christian Association of Nigeria in Gombe ensured the school was closed down to avoid escalation. CAN also demanded the arrest and prosecution of Christiana’s killers. The Christian Teachers Association also decided that Christian teachers would not enter classes until the perpetrators were arrested.

Culprits And The Law

There is no recorded case of anyone who had been tried and convicted over blasphemy in Nigeria, despite the number of people that had been reported killed by religious mobs.

After public outrage at the killing of Deborah, the Sokoto State Police Command swiftly moved to arrest culprits. Two of Deborah’s colleagues, Aminu Abdullahi and Isa Haruna, were arrested and detained. The school was also ordered closed for three months, while the suspects arrested were taken to court.

But nearly a year after, the case has remained dormant while the suspects have remained in prison custody. The Sokoto State Police spokesperson, Sanusi Abubakar, a Deputy Superintendent of Police, said he did not know what was happening to the case when THE WHISTLER spoke to him. The spokesman of the school, Sani Garba, however confirmed that the suspects were still in prison custody and have not returned to the school. Subsequently, the suspected murderers, Bilyaminu Aliyu and Aminu Hukunci, were on May 16 docked at a Sokoto Chief Magistrate’s Court for their alleged participation in the crime.

So also as the case lingers on, the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has petitioned the International Criminal Court (ICC) in The Hague, Netherlands, demanding the arrest and prosecution of Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal, for crimes against humanity over his wilful refusal to follow up on the killers of a Christian female student of Shehu Shagari College Of Education, Sokoto, Deborah Samuel. 

THE WHISTLER was also unable to see the file of Christiana when our correspondent visited the Gombe State Police Command. This website gathered that 15 suspects were arrested after a mob killed Christiana inside her college, but the case has died a natural death.

The Police Public Relations Officer of the Gombe Command, Maheed Mu’azu Abubakar, said he didn’t know anything about the case, but promised to get the files.

Several calls later put across to him about the case yielded no fruits. He said he checked but couldn’t find anything on the case because it happened since 2007. He said he was posted to the Command in 2019.

“I could not trace any person that knows the case because I’m supposed to get it from Research and Planning, but they could not locate the case. So many things, or they could not trace the names of the suspects,” he told our correspondent.

A Police source later told THE WHISTLER that the police had closed the case and once a case is closed “the file is taken to a store room, they end up spoiled or rats eat them up.” Even the prosecutors of the case refused to talk when our correspondent called them. Barr Abubakar Jungudo, Director of Public Prosecution as well as the Defense counsel, Ibrahim  Attahir, refused to talk to THE WHISTLER on the issue.

So, Why Are Culprits Not Punished?

THE WHISTLER started the investigation from the Nigerian Constitution and laws. What does the law say about blasphemy killings? Nothing of substance was found. Christian and Muslim lawyers who spoke to this newspaper revealed that one of the challenges of prosecuting perpetrators is the absence of laws on blasphemy.

Barr Chidi Jude Dimgba, Principal Partner of Chidi Dimgba Co, and Founder, Legal Access Foundation International, noted that “blasphemy is not that thing you call a crime. There’s no where it is constitutionally recognised as a crime in the country, but blasphemy for us, is restricted to certain beliefs of people.

“It’s not recognised in the constitution to say it is a crime. It’s unknown. It’s something based on belief, but law deals with law and facts, not in terms of what is a belief system.”

Barr Nuhu Abdullsalam, a lecturer at the Faculty of Law, University of Abuja, said, “In secularism, the constitution paved the way for tolerating one another under section 10 of the constitution. Ordinarily, the country is not meant for one religion only, maybe Islam or Christianity. Constitutionally, we ought to be one under section 10. The constitution spoke about oneness. That no religion can show that the country belongs to him or her, or to a particular religion.”

Islam Punishes Blasphemy With Death

While the Nigerian Constitution may not have provided for any crime known as blasphemy, it is a serious crime in Islam which may cause the execution of the offender.

According to Rasheed Abdulganiyu, a professor at the  Department of Religious Studies, Gombe State University, in an Islamic state where the law is enforced by the authority, there are penalties for blasphemy.

But blasphemy can only be punished after “a lot of investigations and trials”  and the penalty “may lead to the extent that says this person may be executed.”

He said individuals are not permitted in Islam to take the laws into their hands.” Islam never said even if the person kills your relative, you should take the law into your hands, you just have to leave it for those in authority to take the necessary steps and do the necessary investigation.”

Another Muslim scholar, Sheikh Hussein Yusuf Mabera, Coordinator of Centre for Islamic Propagation and Comparative Religious Education, Sokoto, agrees with  Prof Abdulganiy. He said Chapter 5 verse 33-34 of the Qur’an talks about blasphemy and other crimes and stipulates the punishment.

According to the Qur’an, blasphemy is seen as “waging war against the Almighty God and His Prophet,” and the punishment “is that they should either be crucified or their hands and feet be amputated, or should be expelled from the surface of the earth (life imprisonment).”

Both scholars said those engaged in blasphemy killings in Nigeria are youths who are either acting under extremists’ indoctrination or those who could not control their anger and took the law into their hands.

Role Of Govt In Blasphemy Killings

Many Nigerians have criticized the federal and state governments for encouraging blasphemy killing, due to lack of political will to prosecute suspected perpetrators.

Prof Abdulghaniyu said the government is “not sincere in tackling blasphemy killings,” in the country. “If someone abuses a political leader, people  will be arrested because it affects them, but when somebody is making a mockery of another person’s religious symbol, how much does the government take it seriously?,” he asked.

Barr Dimgba calls it “selective prosecution of criminal offences,” adding that it’s the reason perpetrators “have the guts to do it again.”

He said: “Why we keep having cases of blasphemy reoccur is because maybe the authorities or the people that are supposed to do the arrests did not make the arrest, or maybe, when they make the arrest, those that are supposed to prosecute do not have them prosecuted. Or perhaps, they started with the prosecution and those who are supposed to conclude it did not do so, somewhere along the line the process was truncated.

“Why we have such a crime happen again is because there was no punishment. Today, we are still talking about one popular case – Deborah. It only came up then, but today nobody has known what has happened. Same thing happened to the Redeem Woman who was preaching early in the morning. She was killed as well, till date we don’t know what has happened to the case.”

– This story was produced with the support of the International Center for Journalists (ICFJ) in partnership with Code for Africa.