The family of the acclaimed winner of the June 1993 Presidential Election, Chief M. K. O. Abiola, whose wife Kudirat was murdered by agents suspected to be loyal to the ruling military government, has rejected the judgement of an Appeal Court discharging and acquitting Major Hamza Al Mustapha and Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan, who are the accused in the trial.
In a statement titled Is This The Face of Justice in Nigeria, the Kudirat Initiative for Democracy (KIND) argued that the finding and the reasoning of the High Court Judge 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 and Muhammed Abdul had, at the early stage of the trial, testified that they were directed to murder Alhaja Abiola, by Major Al Mustapha; that they were given information on her movements by Alhaji 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,” Executiive Director of KIND, Amy Oyekunle wrote in a statement.
“The court found that it was cogently, compellingly and irresistibly proven beyond reasonable doubt by the prosecution that Major Al Mustapha was the person who procured Barnabas Jabila, the ‘Force striker’, to eliminate Alhaja 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.”
Lamenting that Friday’s judgment of Hon. Justice Amina A. Augie (Presiding Justice of the Court of Appeal panel), Hon. Justice Rita N. Pemu, and Hon. Justice Fatima O. Akinbami reversed the judgment of Hon. Justice Mojisola Dada, KIND disclose its intention to obtain the judgment and commission a team of legal experts to study it in detail in order to determine the necessity of a civil action.
“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 Abiola on his own, without having been directed to do so; or was his confession a lie also?,” KIND queried.
“With the reversal, the Nigerian Judiciary has now exonerated 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 — Muhammed Abacha, General Ishaya Bamaiyi, and the Police Officers, Alhaji Danbaba, and Rabo Lawal — had been set free. Also, the men who were herded into court for the assassination of Pa Alfred Rewane were released, for want of evidence.”
It also lamented failure of the Judiciary to unearth the identities of the December 2002 murderers of then-Attorney General of the Federation late Chief Bola 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 wondered.
However, immediate past Vice Chairman of Senate Committee on the Federal Capital Territory (FCT), Anthony Agbo congratulated Al Mustapha on his release from detention.
“I wish to congratulate Colonel Hamza Al Mustapha and his immediate family on his recent freedom from the protracted trial in the courts,” Agbo said.
“The young man has suffered as if he was the sole catalyst of the June 12 saga. There could be other people that could have done much more deeds than he did but they did not pass through what he suffered in the last 15 years. He was only a loyal servant to a Head of State of the Federal Republic of Nigeria. I congratulate him.”
Agbo urged the country to put the events of that era behind and rather embrace full complete and comprehensive reconciliation, observing that Al Mustapha’s freedom should open up the great door for national healing.
But in the clearest indication yet that the legal suit has only just begun, erstwhile president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Chief Wole Olanipekun (SAN) revealed that the state could appeal the decision within 90 days if dissatisfied with last week’s judgment.
“In all criminal cases, the prosecution has the duty of establishing the guilt of an accused person beyond reasonable doubt,” he said. “In this particular instance, the prosecution has the right to appeal the judgment to the Supreme Court if it is not satisfied with what the appellate court has decided.”
Olanipekun vouched for the integrity of the three Justices who sat on the appeal, saying they are all respected and respectable.
“I have no reservation about the integrity of each of them,” he said. “While the killing or cold murder of Kudirat Abiola will eternally hunt and eventually sniff life out of the perpetrator(s), judges are only expected to give judgments according to law and established facts and no more.”
