The barbaric lynching to death of a young female teacher, Islamic preacher, and mother of four, Ummulkhair Usman Aliyu, in Kaduna penultimate week, over allegations of child kidnapping should jolt the North to action, wake it from its slumber, and set the internet on fire. None of these happened. This only added impetus to the North’s culture of silence and the previous perpetuation of such acts without consequences.
The phenomenon of extrajudicial killings remains a critical challenge to the rule of law across Nigeria. However, in the North, while mob actions sometimes stem from allegations of petty theft or civil disputes, the most prominent and severe cases often involve accusations of religious blasphemy.
The latest flimsy and unverified claim of child kidnapping led to the murder of Ummulkhair. “Ummulkhair was taken from lawful custody on the basis of unverified allegations, stripped of her dignity, denied due process, and brutally killed in circumstances that exposed a dangerous collapse of civic order,” the Muslim Public Affairs Centre (MPAC) noted, adding that “no allegation, no matter how sensitive, justifies mob execution. A society that permits suspicion to override law is a society sliding into anarchy.”
And that is the lot of the North today in the context of the national malaise insecurity has become. While the rest of the country gets outraged and is challenged to act or seek creative solutions, the North seems too numbed to act.
When insecurity threatened to overwhelm the South-West in 2020, Amotekun was created and driven by all the governors of the region. I am yet to see such a coordinated initiative by the northern political class, so insecurity continues to fester. Amotekun might not have succeeded in totally curbing insecurity, but it already has a place in history.
Apart from MPAC, which expressed “profound outrage and moral indignation” over Ummulkhair’s murder, there has been no commensurate condemnation from Muslim personalities and Islamic organisations like JNI and NSCIA. Speaking against jungle justice in the name of Islam by those who matter, and the trial of offenders by governments, could nip it in the bud.
Yet the litany of such cases in the North, as documented by human rights organisations and legal registries confirming the horrific incidents across religious lines affecting Christians and Muslims alike, is disturbing. In many instances, investigations later reveal that religious accusations were weaponised to settle personal grudges, commercial rivalries, or local disputes.
In July 1999, one Abdullahi Umaru from Kebbi State, a Muslim, was lynched by miscreants following accusations of making disrespectful remarks. Oluwaseesan Shuka was falsely accused in Gombe State in March 2007. Mrs. Shuka was invigilating an Islamic Knowledge examination at Government Secondary School, Gandu. While collecting personal belongings to prevent cheating, she confiscated a student’s bag which allegedly contained a copy of the Qur’an. An accusation of desecration was raised, leading to a mob burning her to death.
Bridget Agbahime met the same fate in June 2016 at Kofar Wambai Market in Kano. She got into an argument that escalated into accusations of blasphemy during the dispute. A mob gathered at the market, beat her to death, and attempted to burn her body before security forces intervened.
Another case is that of Tanka Yakasai, which occurred in Kano State in 2018. Yakasai, a Muslim, was attacked and killed by an angry mob following accusations of insulting religious sensibilities, highlighting how local mobs could turn on members of their own religious community over verbal disputes.
Then came the widely reported case of Deborah Samuel Yakubu, which took place in Sokoto in May 2022. She was a Christian and a second-year student at the Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto. She was killed for objecting to religious posts being published in a WhatsApp group meant strictly for academic assignments, an objection that was deemed blasphemous.
A month later, in the nation’s capital, FCT Abuja, Ahmad Usman, a Muslim member of a local security vanguard, was mobbed to death following an argument with an Islamic cleric that escalated into accusations of blasphemy.
A year later, in June 2023, Usman Buda, a Muslim butcher, was lynched by a mob of fellow traders at the Sokoto Central Market over an alleged blasphemous remark made during an argument. Subsequent findings by civil society organisations, including Amnesty International, indicated that the religious accusation was fabricated or heavily manipulated to settle commercial rivalries over market stall sales.
In all these cases before Ummulkhair’s, no guilty verdict was ever established against anyone despite the fact that Section 33 of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria guarantees the right to life, and Section 36 ensures the right to a fair hearing, in a country where murder and arson are criminal offences and human rights violations, but only on paper. Here lies the crux of the matter. How can a region endure such injustices and hope to make progress?
On this, we urge Governor Uba Sani to commit to ensuring that justice is done to the memory of a woman who dedicated her life to imparting knowledge and spreading the gospel of Islam. The governor, while on a visit to the deceased’s family, disclosed that he is working with relevant security agencies to “get to the root of the matter” so that the 41 persons so far charged with culpable homicide are duly prosecuted.
This culture of silence and these cases of extrajudicial killings must stop, and the criminal justice system must take its course. In this onerous task, the media should not display bias in their reporting. The political class should show leadership by activating all relevant security agencies and the judiciary to provide justice and closure to victims and their families. The death penalty is the ultimate punishment for this kind of crime. Governors should therefore stop shying away from signing death warrants for convicted culprits.
If the police are found wanting, as alleged in Ummulkhair’s death, they should pay for their negligence. Law enforcement standing by the accused and protecting their integrity until they are found guilty should be the hallmark of police work, not giving up an accused person to be mobbed to death. If the police cannot tame and subdue unruly mobs and protect suspects in their custody, I wonder where citizens should run to. Surely, in this case, the police have a case to answer.
Don’t we have sufficient anger to display in cases like this? There should be revulsion, outrage, and condemnation across the land. Instead, we resort to name-calling and religious bias while leaving the substantive matter of criminality unattended.
I couldn’t agree more with MPAC’s statement that “this was an organised savagery enabled by rumour, fear, and institutional failure,” as espoused by its Executive Chairman, Disu Kamor, who added that the “killing of Ummulkhair is not an isolated incident. It is part of a worsening pattern where rumours rapidly mutate into violence, and where accused persons are denied the protection of institutions mandated to uphold justice. This culture of instant punishment is a direct threat to national stability.”
Zainab Suleiman Okino (FNGE) chairs the Editorial Board of Blueprint Newspaper. She is a syndicated columnist and can be reached via: [email protected]
