Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) Atiku Abubakar has revisited the killing of Deborah Samuel, a student of the Shehu Shagari College of Education Sokoto, by irate Muslim students for alleged blasphemy in May 2022.
Atiku spoke on the matter during an appearance on The Peoples Town Hall organised by Channels Television after a viewer querried his decision in taking down a post on Twitter initially condemning the murder in May.
The former Vice President had tweeted at the time of the incident, “There cannot be a justification for such gruesome murder. Deborah Yakubu was murdered, and all those behind her death must be brought to justice. My condolences to her family and friends.”
He deleted the tweet after coming under backlash from his supposed northern supporters. Atiku explained at the time that he did not sign off on the tweet before it was posted, as he usually did.
Explaining his action on Sunday night, Atiku said he condemned the murder because it was against the tenets of Islam for anybody to take someone’s life without following due process.
He said, “I have said that I asked that the tweet be deleted because I normally approve every tweet. So, since I didn’t approve it, I said delete it.
“If you read my subsequent statements on that matter, I condemned it. There is nowhere, where it is said or it is an injunction in the Islamic faith that you can go and take somebody’s life. Nowhere! It has to be through due process.”
