Mr. and Mrs. Emmanuel Garba, late Deborah’s parents…
By Mary BASSEY, Senior Investigator correspondent, Lagos/
LAGOS- CONSTITUTIONAL Lawyer and human rights activist, Barrister David Olayinka Sanni has described the gruesome murder of Deborah Samuel for alleged blasphemy against Prophet Muhammed as an act premeditated by her Muslim classmate killers, warning that if this barbaric act in the name of religion was not checked and nipped in the bud, it may soon snowball into religious war in the country.
The Lagos lawyer who was a Muslim but later converted to Christianity said there was nowhere in the Holy Quran where Prophet Muhammed was angry with whoever despised him let alone imposing death sentence on the person. He noted with dismay that in this 21st century, course mates could pick up arms against fellow course mate over religious intolerance
A visibly angry lawyer said the Police and the school authority were culpable in the gruesome death of the young girl for not doing the needful when needed. According to him, the school security which took Deborah into custody when she was pursued by her Muslim course mates had everything within its capacity to protect the girl even as it could have reached out to the Police for a backup.
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He is most pained that of the entire mammoth crowd, only two suspects were arrested by the Police for the crime. He said, “The act was premeditated, no doubt. She must have been so opposed to Muslim as a religion and her killers saw that terse WhatsApp statement to unleash terror on her. But in all these, I see collusion in the whole thing. The school security post which took custody of her could have saved her if they wanted. There is no way a handful of angry student could overpowered the security men on duty.
Aside that, the Police which were contacted as the time the matter went beyond their capacity didn’t help matter. If they had responded on time, the situation would have been brought under control. They waited till the girl was stoned and beaten to death and recorded and later set ablaze. That was unbearable. I heard her parents said they have left everything to God, but posterity will judge whoever is culpable in this entire thing that may soon tear this country apart.
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Meanwhile, parents to the murder student, Mr. and Mrs. Emmanuel Garba have unanimously resigned to fate describing the murder of their daughter as tragic and terrible. Both parent who spoke at the burial ground at their Tunga Magajiya Village in Rijau LGA Area of Niger State said, “What can we do, we have left everything to God.
There is nothing anybody can do about it, she is dead she is dead. Our daughter was number 2 out of the seven children we had. We were praying to God that when she finished school and starts work, she should be able to help take care of her siblings. But now she is dead.”
My Emmanuel who works with the Niger State Water Works Corporation at Tunga Magajiya said the state government abandoned her in this travail saying, “I went to the mortuary to pick my daughter’s remain. I paid N120,000.00 to convey the corpse down to my village and had to bury her immediately. So we are just hope on God for help in this situation. There is nothing anybody can do about this.”
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