• Tasks NASS on probe of Awo-Omamma wedding guests massacre

Disappionted by what it termed a cover-up, a civil rights group, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA), has called on the Sokoto State government under Governor Aminu Tambuwal to ensure quick dispensation of justice in the murder of Deborah Samuel. HURIWA also condemned the hierarchies of Nigeria Police and the Department of State Services (DSS) whose operatives reportedly witnessed the mob action meted out to the defenceless Christian girl from Niger State, accused of alleged blasphemy by Islamic extremists in May 2022. She was a 200-level student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto. Vexed by what appeared like sweeping crime under the carpet, the rights group warned of the profound implications of letting murderers walk freely in the streets of Nigeria by a democratically elected Sokoto State government. The group in a statement by its National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, yesterday, said the loud silence by governor Aminu Tambuwal on this despicable, primitive, irrational, vexations crime against humanity and the deliberate lack of information to the general public on this matter, is a severe blight on the public image of the Sokoto State governor, who for many years was a senior national legislator and even became a Speaker of the Federal House of Representatives. “Deborah Samuel was a Christian who went to find knowledge in Sokoto the citadel of learning but was killed over purported blasphemy by an unruly mob in the presence of law enforcement agents. The Sokoto State governor even put up a flimsy excuse for the armed security operatives’ inability or unwillingness to disperse the killer mob that killed Deborah and thereby watched until the young innocent Northern Christian girl was lynched to her death and her remains set alight.” The group said if the Sokoto State governor is unable to resolve this unique but disturbing case of murder as soon as possible, Civil Society Organisations (CSOs) will definitely approach the international community to take steps to compel the governor to fish out the killers for appropriate justice in line with the laws of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

SIMILARLY, HURIWA has requested the National Assembly’s public petitions committee to investigate the alleged killings of wedding guests in Awo-Omamma, Imo State by Ebubeagu. HURIWA said it is totally obscene and unconstitutional and indeed unconscionable that the Imo State governor and the DSS are both narrating a different version of the killings, which the villagers have alleged were killings done in public execution-style by the Ebubeagu. The civil rights body said it is shocking that days after the alleged wedding guests were allegedly murdered, the DSS is reported to have claimed that those killed died during an exchange of fire, which is contrary to the claims made by the villagers who raised the alarm in the first place. “Going by the deep gulf in all the claims about the killings, the need has therefore arisen for the lawmakers in Abuja to act to safeguard human rights.”

“We are hereby asking the committees on public petitions of both chambers of the National Assembly to suo moto initiate an open, transparent and publicised independent investigation into the alleged killings,” the group said.