Prominent Civil Rights Advocacy body, Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria, HURIWA, has instituted a petition to the International Criminal Court, ICC, in the Hagues, Netherlands, demanding the arrest, prosecution of Aminu Tambuwal, Sokoto State Governor over his wilful failure to arrest and prosecute the gruesome murder by Islamic extremists that stoned to death the Christian student Miss Deborah Samuel Yakubu in Sokoto.
According to a press release issued yesterday, the petition dated May 23rd 2023, HURIWA through the petition signed by Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, the National Coordinator, stated that the criminal refusal to bring the killers of Deborah Samuel to justice was a crime against humanity just as the Rights group asked the ICC to use the service of InterPol to arrest Mr. Tambuwal immediately he entered Europe.
The Petition read in parts: “It is with utmost respect that we at the Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria HURIWA, a foremost human rights protection group in Nigeria, send the following petition to the International Criminal Court, through the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP, which is responsible for initiating investigation of alleged genocide or crimes against humanity, upon receipt of concrete to reasonably support such allegations.
“This petition therefore, is in pursuance of the attainment of the basic and fundamental objective of the setting up of the International Criminal Court ICC, whose establishing legislation, the Rome Treaty, made it quite clear that its essence, was to end impunity in respect of four critical genres of serious crimes including genocide and crimes against humanity.
“This is particularly so, in situations where the perpetrators of such crimes are state actors, who are constitutionally supposed to stamp out the commission of such crimes.
“The Governor of Sokoto State, Alhaji Aminu Tambuwal, under whose direct jurisdiction the crime took place and whose duty it was to arrest and prosecute these criminals, was clearly unenthusiastic to carry out his constitutional duties in this respect. Obviously, with the general elections a few months away at the time, the governor was clearly not ready to incur the wrath of his largely Muslim population by appearing to support the act of ‘blasphemy’ against holy prophet Mohammed.
“It was therefore not surprising that this senseless gruesome killing of an innocent defenseless young lady which led to a lot of uproar all over the country and even in the international community, was not officially treated with the seriousness that it deserves by the responsible state actors.”
HURIWA noted that going through the reproduced provisions of section 33 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria above, it was clear that Miss Deborah Samuel did not deserve to die, most certainly not at the time, way and manner of her needless and cruel death.
“Her demise therefore ought to have called for an immediate pursuit of justice for her, by the various agencies of the state, led of course by the governor of Sokoto state, who like his counterparts in other states, goes by the sobriquet/title of the Chief Security Officer of his state, Sokoto State.
It is equally noteworthy to observe that the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP of the International Criminal Court ICC, had already concluded a Preliminary Examination which we cited at the beginning of this petition, showing that happenings in Nigeria makes it an appropriate place for urgent intervention by the ICC,” the group explained.
The group futher called on the Office of the Prosecutor, OTP, to immediately begin the processes that would ultimately lead to the arrest and prosecution of the Governor of Sokoto State for failing to arrest and prosecute the killers of Miss Deborah Samuel in Sokoto Nigeria, over a year ago.
