What looks like a case of the law going after the poor and the downtrodden has occurred in Nigeria. A Federal High Court sitting in Wawa Cantonment, Kainji, Niger State, has sentenced 35-year old Haruna Yahaya, a cripple, for terrorism offences.
Yahaya, who is crippled in his left arm and left leg, was convicted for being a member of the proscribed Boko Haram terrorist group and for participating in the abduction of over 200 schoolgirls in Chibok, Borno State, in 2014. He was said to have participated in the group’s attacks in Chibok, Chibok Local Government Area and Gabsuri town in the Damboa Local Government.
He reportedly pleaded guilty to the two counts preferred against him by the government but pleaded for mercy, saying he was forcefully conscripted into the terrorist group. But the judge who sat in one of the four special courts established by the Federal High Court to speed up the trial of over 1,000 suspects said the court was “not fooled” by Yahaya’s story.
The judge noted that the convict was “using the misfortune of his handicap to draw sympathy.” He therefore ruled that the 15-year sentence passed on the convict who had been in detention since 2015 would start to count from next Monday.
Whichever way one looks at this verdict, one fact sticks out like a bad finger – the Boko Haram leader, Abubakar Shekau, and his top aides have remained free because the Nigerian authorities cannot bring them to book.
