Deborah Samuel: Wole Soyinka Wants National Mosque Imam Sacked

Following the recent riot in Sokoto State over alleged blasphemy, Nobel laureate, Professor Wole Soyinka, has called for the sack of the Imam, National Mosque, Abuja, Professor Ibrahim Maqari, over a comment on the killing of Deborah Samuel.

OSUN DEFENDER recalls that Deborah, a 200-level student of the Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto was killed by Muslim men who accused her of blasphemy against the Prophet Muhammad.

Reacting to the unfortunate incident, Mr Maqari stressed that the Muslims have some red lines which must not be crossed, saying if issues of blasphemy against the prophet are not addressed, the Muslims would address it themselves.

Speaking in Abuja on Saturday during the one-year remembrance of the late former Chief of Army Staff, Lt.-Gen. Ibrahim Attahiru, Soyinka accused the Imam of directing followers to take laws into their hands.

Soyinka said, “Professor Maqari, however, insists, with a handful of others, including vocal serving policemen quite recently, that there is no remorse involved in the torture and lynching of a young student on this earth.

“Maqari has implicitly directed his followers to take the law into their own hands in the name of religion, and innovation. That is the message of a supposedly holy man to a nation embroiled in his madness of multiple incidences.”