By Onyofufeke Musa
She was brilliant, beautiful, and focused. A leading intellectual light in her class,

Deborah Samuel, a student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto was full of life as she went to school to prepare for her semester examination.

Unknown to her, death lurked in the corner. Some of her schoolmates who are Muslims in the Muslim-dominated northern state of Sokoto held grudges against her for her exceptional academic performance.

They had been curious to know her source of brilliance. A simple message and an innocent voice note she posted on the group WhatsApp platform alluding to the favour upon her by Jesus Christ was all that was needed to spark the waiting fury of her traducers.

Within minutes, some radicalised Muslim students had mobilised their ranks joined by non-students from outside the school. Deborah was pulled from her class, clubbed to death, and her remains set on fire.

Her dream was dramatically cut short in her prime, in the goriest way. The premises of the school where she went to seek knowledge to pave the way for a future that was not be had been closed.

Not satisfied, her murderers took their campaign of violence and blood to the relatively quiet ancient town of Sokoto, the seat of the caliphate reverted and by all Muslim faithful where even the Sultan was threatened and innocent traders attacked and their businesses looted. It was a moment of madness and uncontrollable rage motivated by the urgent need to fight for their God.

FUTA gets first female VC

In her greatest moment of need, Deborah was deserted, not even her country and the school offered could save her from her murderers.

Deborah’s case is one too many of how fellow citizens’ lives are cut short over perceived religious differences in a country that professes secularism but only on paper. Many have asked, is any religious belief higher than the law that governs a nation? Are there persons who are above the law and can kill with impunity?

The worry of many Nigerians who have been reacting to the killing of Deborah is the fear that the perpetrators, like others before them, would be left to escape to return another day.

Three days after her gruesome murder on May 12, 2022, for alleged blasphemy, Deborah’s ghost has been haunting Nigeria, a country sharply divided along ethno-religious lines. The faultiness only just got deeper under the watch of President Muhammadu Buhari since he came to power on May 29, 2015.

A schoolmate who identified herself simply as Rakiya gave an account of how Deborah’s voice note degenerated into an uncontrollable situation.

Rakiya recounted the last moment of Deborah saying, “Deborah was my course mate. I just stepped into the class when the uproar on her voice note started.

“It was her coursemates that started it. One of them said Deborah dared them by refusing to apologise when she was asked to. It all started with a debate on the upcoming examination on a general WhatsApp platform created for our coursemates. One of the students asked her how she passed the last semester’s examination and in response, she said it was ‘Jesus o.

“Immediately, about three other chats came in from two Muslims and one Christian, telling her to retract the statement. Two students from other departments who overheard some Muslim boys discussing the matter told Deborah’s close friends to prevail on her to retract the statement. But she replied via a voice note on the platform ‘Holy Ghost fire. Nothing will happen to me.

Is it by force that you guys will always be sending this religious stuff to this group? The group wasn’t created for that but rather as a notice on the test, assignment, exams, etc, not these nonsense religious posts’

“We were made to understand that some young men were brought from outside before the outrage. I was in class when some of our course mates rushed in, saying ‘there is fire on the mountain o.
She was dragged out, flogged, and stoned. The last word in her mouth was “what do you hope to achieve with this?”

Vol. 3 Edition 35

This unfortunate incident evoked lots of reactions. Some Twitter users have taken to the microblogging platform to recount experiences of similar situations they have experienced living in the northern part of Nigeria.

The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN), in a statement, titled “Deborah’s killers must be brought to book” in Abuja, by CAN’s General Secretary, Joseph Bade Daramola, condemned the gruesome murder of Deborah demanding that the federal government investigate the killing and swiftly bring the perpetrators to justice

The Christian body said, “Killing for any God in the name of blasphemy is ungodly, satanic, foolish, reprehensible, and unacceptable. This is not a Stone Age and Nigeria is not a banana republic. Nigeria remains a non-religious State where no religion is supreme to the other.”

The statement had further read “The Christian Association of Nigeria (CAN) condemns in strong terms the gruesome murder of a Christian, 200-Level student of Shehu Shagari College of Education, Sokoto, Deborah Samuel by some extremist fellow students on alleged blasphemy.
“The unlawful and dastardly action of the perpetrators must not only be condemned by all right-thinking people but the security operatives must fish them out, prosecute them as it is expected of them.

“It is the failure of the security agencies and the government to rise to such criminalities in the past that gave birth to terrorists and bandits. And as long as the State fails to bring these beasts and criminals amidst us to book, so also society will continue to be their killing fields.

“We acknowledge and commend the restraint of the Christian students of the College who refused to embrace self-help and reprisal attacks on those who murdered their colleague. It is our prayer that those vampires in religious garments will not push the country to a religious war. This is why both the government and the security agencies must stop treating them with kid gloves. Enough is enough.”

Also, Pan Yoruba’s socio-political organisation, Afenifere, condemned the killing of Deborah.

Afenifere, in a statement by its National Publicity Secretary, Jare Ajayi, recalled that actions bordering on religious intolerance have been occurring so much, particularly in the north.

The Yoruba body stated that failure to take drastic actions against perpetrators of such acts has only encouraged it to happen often and again.

It said, “This Deborah tragedy must be used to put a permanent stop to faith-induced murder in our land.”

Also reacting, the British High Commissioner to Nigeria, Catriona Laing, condemned the killing in a tweet on Friday.

Laing called on the authorities to ensure that the perpetrators of the act face justice, “I condemn the murder of Deborah Samuel in Sokoto, and urge the police and relevant authorities to ensure the perpetrators of this horrific act are made to face justice in line with the law.”

Lalong vows to complete all ongoing projects before leaving office

Similarly, the Northern States Christian Elders Forum (NOSCEF), in a statement signed by its Chairman, Ejoga Inalegwu, tasked the government to “make a public example and make a new statement by quickly bringing the perpetrators to book.
“The death of Deborah Samuel is one too many by mobs wearing a cloak of religion in the North. In a country where there is a law, nobody, group or individuals has a right to take another’s life whatsoever, outside the due process of law.”

The group welcomed the condemnations across the board but expressed the hope that “this will not be the usual rhetoric of condemnations and then the case is swept under the carpet with publicized arrests, no prosecution or jaundiced prosecution and letting off the hook when the outcries die down.

The group urged the authorities “to commit themselves to stamp out these brutalities that have no value for life before they completely consume the entire North in particular and Nigeria as a nation if Nigeria is not dismembered as a result.”

A coalition of 300 women organisations under the aegis of Womanifesto has also come out to protest the killing of Deborah by Muslim fundamentalists, emphasising, “Enough is Enough”, in a statement titled ‘Women groups in Nigeria condemn the cold-blooded execution of Deborah for ‘religious blasphemy’, signed on their behalf by the Executive Director, Women Advocates Research and Documentation Centre, Dr Abiola Akiyode-Afolabi.

NAF pledges to redouble effort against terrorists, bandits

The woman described her murder without protection from the school authorities as to the most egregious yet of the pattern of religious intolerance in Nigeria.
While calling on the Attorney-General and Minister of Justice of the Federation to take public interest in the matter alongside the killing of other women, the coalition demanded the declaration of a state of emergency on the killings of women and girls.

Womanifesto also requested a concerted and collective call out on all states which have not implemented the VAP Act 2015.

The rage and reactions dominated the weekend as Aminu Tambuwal, Governor of Sokoto state met with religious leaders in the state after imposing a curfew to curtail the spread of the violence.
Despite these efforts, many want the government to rein in the murderers in the North who kill and maim others in the name of a peaceful religion, Islam.