By Amy Oyekunle
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| Kudirat Abiola |
The Kudirat
Initiative for Democracy (KIND) hereby
expresses its shock and disappointment at the judgment of the Court of
Appeal, Lagos Division, today, July 12, 2013, which overturned the
Judgment of the High Court of Lagos State, which had found Major Hamza Al
Mustapha, one time Chief Security Officer to General Sani Abacha
(1994-1998), and Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan guilty of the June 4, 1996
murder of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola in Lagos, during the reign of terror
of General Sani Abacha, the late military Head of State of Nigeria.
It will be recalled that Hon.
Justice Mojisola Dada of the High Court of Lagos State, Igbosere Lagos,
had on January 30, 2012, found both Major Hamza Al Mustapha and Alhaji
Lateef Shofolahan guilty of the offences of conspiracy to
murder and murder of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola, contrary to 324
and 319 of the Criminal Code of Lagos State and accordingly had sentenced
them to death by hanging.
On that occasion, KIND issued a
statement. The statement recalled the gruesome murder of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola
in 1996 and the supreme sacrifice made by many other Nigerians, including Chief
M.K.O Abiola and Pa Alfred Ogbeyiwa Rewane, to restore democracy to
Nigeria. The statement then acknowledged the fact that the verdict issued by Mojisola
Dada would bring closure to the children of Kudirat Abiola, the M.K.O
Abiola Family and Nigerians committed to justice.
The finding and the reasoning
of Hon. Justice Mojisola Dada in her judgment was that the evidence
of Barnabas Jabila ( a.k.a Sgt. Rogers) and that of Muhammed Abdul (a.k.a
Katako), the two prosecution witnesses was credible, reliable,
sufficient and believable, and that the Court could safely
convict Major Hamza Al Mustpaha and Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan on
that evidence, regardless of the fact that during cross examination and
re-examination, the two witnesses retracted their earlier given testimony and
recanted. The Court found that retraction as an after-thought.
Barnabas Jabila ( a.k.a Sgt.
Rogers) and Muhammed Abdul (a.k.a Katako) had, at the early stage of the trial
testified that they were directed to murder Alhaja Kudirat Abiola,
by Major Hamza Al Mustapha; that they were given information on
her movements by Alhaji Lateef Sofolahan; and that they, respectively, shot and
killed Alhaji Kudirat Abiola and drove the Peugeot 504 Car, which they used in
trailing her car and bolting away, after killing her at the Cargo
Vision Area of the Lagos end of the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway, by the Toll Gate.
The Court found that it was
cogently, compellingly and irresistibly proved beyond reasonable doubt by the
Prosecution that Major Hamza Al Mustapha was the person who
procured Barnabas Jabila, the ‘Force striker’, to eliminate Alhaja Kudirat
Abiola by direct instruction, handing over of the murder weapon, the UZI SMG
with 9mm rounds with which she was assassinated in broad daylight on the
streets of Lagos and who provided ‘the logistics’ for their movement from Abuja
to Lagos by flight, their accommodation at his Lagos official residence at Dodan
Barracks and linked them up with their contact person and
facilitator, Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan.
Today’s judgment of Hon
Justice Amina A. Augie (presiding justice of the Court of Appeal’s Panel), Hon.
Justice Rita N. Pemu, and Hon. Justice Fatima O. Akinbami, reversing the
judgment of Hon. Justice Mojisola Dada, has now discarded that Court’s
findings and rejected the Court’s reasoning.
KIND is informed that the grounds
of the Court of Appeal’s decision included the “contradiction in the testimony
of the Prosecution Witnesses”, the non-corroboration of their testimony, being
co-accomplices; the non-adducing of medical evidence (including non-tendering
of autopsy and ballistician report), the non-investigation of the crime by the
Nigeria Police Force, which it is argued has the sole power to investigate the
crime, instead of the hybrid Special Investigation Panel (SIP) and the
non-calling of the Police to give evidence.
While KIND will obtain this
Judgment and commission a team of legal experts to study it in detail, with a
view to determining whether a civil action is advisable at this point, KIND
respectfully acknowledges but vehemently disagrees with the Judgment of the
Court of Appeal.
True, the Prosecution Witnesses
recanted and alleged that they were tutored to frame up the accused person. The
question is, why was their recantation more believable than their initial and
original testimony? Could Sgt Rogers, who was not put on trial, have
killed Alhaja Kudirat Abiola on his own, without having been directed to do so;
or was his confession a lie also?
With this reversal, the Nigerian
Judiciary has now exonerated ALL persons that were brought to trial for the
gruesome acts of murders and attempted murders that took place during the
Abacha regime (before now, the persons tried for the attempted assassinations
of Alex Ibru and Pa Abraham Adesanya had been set free, Muhammed Abacha,
General Ishaya Bamaiyi, and the Police Officers, Alhaji Danbaba, and Rabo
Lawal). Also, the men who were herded into Court for the assassination of Pa
Alfred Rewane were released, for want of evidence.
KIND notes that the Nigerian
Judiciary was also unable to resolve the issue of who murdered, in December
2002, Chief Bola Ige, a sitting Attorney General of the Federation and, indeed
the husband of a then serving Justice of the Court of Appeal, Late Justice
Atinuke Omobonike Ige. Is it that the Nigerian Judiciary is incapable of
resolving cases of political murders and assassinations, or that the Nigerian
State lacks the competence, capability or will to prosecute cases of political
murders?
KIND is of the view that justice
has not been served by the Judgment of the Court of Appeal. KIND therefore
calls on the Attorney-General of Lagos State to exercise his power
over all public prosecution in Lagos State to appeal this verdict in the
interest of the dead and the living.
In making this call, KIND is not
set on seeking vengeance or retribution. As an organization founded in honour
of Kudirat Abiola, it, along with all well meaning Nigerians, seeks a final
judicial resolution of the question, “who killed Kudirat Abiola?”
Ms. Oyekunle is the Executive
Director, Kudirat Initiative for Democracy (KIND).
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