One Nigeria is a lie', cries husband of Igbo trader killed in Kano over alleged blasphemy

          

Pastor Mike Agbahime, the husband of Bridget Agbahime who was brutally murdered by a blood thirsty mob in Kano over alleged blasphemy has declared the notion of national unity and the term 'One Nigeria' is balderdash. Lies. A mirage.

All the people involved in the brutal killing were discharged, acquitted and allowed to walk free by a Kano court because 'they had no case to answer'.  

In an interview with SaharaReporters, Pastor Mike revealed how he was reliably informed that Dauda Ahmed, the principal suspect who led the mob that killed his wife confessed that he planned and killed Mrs Bridget so that he (Dauda) would take over the shop.

Before that faithful day, Dauda would deliberately provoke the murdered woman by leaving his shop which was a distance from hers, to perform ablution in front of hers. Dauda had been warned by the market officials to cease and desist from his actions but he adamantly refused because he had a devilish plot up his sleeve.

The so-called blasphemy was Mrs Bridget's question "Why won’t you allow me to finish packing before you start pouring your water (ablution water) in my shop?"

Immediately Dauda left her presence after the altercation, he started shouting “Allah Akbar.”

Read Pastor Agbahime after the cut.


Why did you relocate from Kano State?
I had to relocate because I reliably gathered that some Muslims were planning to kill me. This was because I am the prime witness to the matter.

While my wife was still in the mortuary, leaving our only son and me, the police arrested the suspects.  They succeeded in arresting Dauda Ahmed and one other person.  This was when Solomon Arase was the Inspector-General of Police.  The then IG also dispatched a team of detectives from Abuja to Kano. The detectives arrested three suspects. I gathered from a reliable source that Dauda confessed to the crime in writing (in Hausa language), saying that he planned and killed my wife in order to take over the shop. The other suspects also confessed to the crime. I was later called by the police to identify all of them, which I did. This was because I knew all of them. 

What is your assessment of the way the police handled the matter? 

It is painful to disclose that after a while, the other two runaway suspects reappeared in the market.  The police were informed about this development, but for a reason which I did not know, they (police) shielded them (from arrest).  Again, when the police had completed their investigations, they told me that they were ready to prosecute the suspects. But for a reason best known to the Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice of Kano State, he refused,  for five months, to file a charge against Dauda and the other arrested suspects.

He (commissioner) refused to take the suspects to the High Court for prosecution. On the contrary, the police in Kano wrote to the then Deputy Inspector-General of Police, who is now the Inspector-General of Police, Ibrahim Idris, for advice. To the dismay of the general public and the international community, a court recently released the suspects, declaring them innocent. It is important to note at this point that the case was in the magistrates’ court for five months without being charged to High Court.

How have you been coping five months after the incident?

It has been like hell on earth. I say this because after they killed my wife, vandalized my vehicle and destroyed my two shops (mine and that of my wife), I now depend on my siblings and members of my church for financial assistance.  Presently, I am not doing anything.

What fresh things did you learn about Nigeria after the matter, especially on the call for national unity?

The saying, “One Nigeria” is just mere balderdash. I say this because the leaders’ mistake is a ‘leading’ mistake.  To buttress it, if our leaders cannot keep the oaths of their offices and cannot respect the sanctity of life and our constitution, there is no need to talk about oneness in Nigeria. I also say this because even if the constitution condemns killing in one part of the country and declares other people who killed in another state innocent, I wonder what kind of constitution that is.