A Catholic priest Rev. Fr Kelvin Ugwu has expressed his disappointment in the poor handling of justice for the late Deborah Samuel who was killed in 2022 over alleged blasphemy.
Ms Samuel, who was studying home economics at Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto, was stoned and burnt to death on May 12, 2022, by irate youths.
It was alleged that she refused to take down a post on social media deemed blasphemous of Prophet Muhammad.
Two suspects, Bilyaminu Aliyu and Aminu Hukunci, were arrested by the police and subsequently remanded.
In August 2022, spokesperson of the Sokoto State Police Command Sanusi Abubakar said those arrested and arraigned were not the prime suspects, but among those who organised the violent riot.
Abubakar said that “efforts are being intensified to arrest the prime suspects.”
On Thursday, however, the priest called out President Muhammadu Buhari, Sokoto State Governor, Aminu Tambuwal; and the police over failure to prosecute Samuel’s killers.
“Tomorrow the 12th of May will make it exactly one year since the young Christian lady Ms Deborah was brutally killed by her fellow students and burnt to ashes in Shehu Shagari College of Education Sokoto, over an alleged and unsubstantiated blasphemy or insult to prophet Muhammad (PBUH),” Ugwu wrote on Facebook.
“I am asking the Governor of Sokoto, Hon Aminu Waziri Tambuwal, please sir, where are the killers of Deborah? Have you found them? Where did you keep them? What did you do to them?
“I am asking President Muhammadu Buhari, where are the killers? Are they invisible? Have they been arrested?
“And to the Nigeria Police Force, what has happened to the swiftness you normally employ in arresting people who make posts on social media you consider inciting and divisive? What did you to do the killers of Ms. Deborah? Where are the killers?”
