Members of a religious organization, As’habul Kahfi Warraqeem, Bauchi State Chapter who are followers of the Kano State Islamic Cleric, Sheikh Abduljabbar Nasiru Kabara have condemned the death judgment passed on the cleric, describing it as a miscarriage of justice by the Upper Sharia Court.
Briefing Journalists in Bauchi on Monday, the group through its PRO, Abdullahi Musa read a text titled ‘The Satanic Gang-up and the Kano State Sharia Court Judgment on our spiritual leader, Sheikh Abduljabbar Nasiru Kabara’.
“We, the members of the above-named organization are followers of the Kano State Islamic Cleric, Sheikh (Dr.) Abduljabbar Nasiru Kabara. We are here to inform the world through you the journalists, our stand on the recent judgment on our leader Sheikh Abduljabbar by a Kano Shari’ah Court that passed death sentence on the Cleric.
“We have resolved to appeal against the judgment in a higher court of law to quash this unsatisfactory judgment and impose his fundamental human rights, especially of freedom of religion and thought as enshrined in the Nigerian constitution,” the group said.
“First of all, we are not satisfied with the judgment, because we believe it was influenced by the Kano state Governor, Abdullahi Ganduje and some Clerics in the state who are known to be at loggerheads with him for a long time. They, therefore, ganged up against him and labelled false allegations of blasphemy against him in order to smear him and eliminate him through the court.”
The group added that “The allegation of blasphemy against the Sheikh is nothing but campaign of calumny and character assassination on the popular cleric by his detractors including Ganduje and some clerics who feel threatened by Abduljabbari’s increasing popularity.”
“Thus, they purported an allegation of blasphemy to give him a bad name and have justification for their evil plan to exterminate his life,” the group added.
“We call on the National Human Rights Commission, Amnesty International, National and International Human rights Organizations and Human Rights Lawyers like the revered Human Rights Lawyer, Mr Femi Falana, respected Human Rights Activist, Ahmad Isa – Ordinary President, and others to join us counter this unfair and unjustified gang up against our religious leader by providing legal aid to the Sheikh Abduljabbar.”
It stressed that “Kano state Government and the hostile Clerics to Abduljabbar have teamed up to exterminate his life for the offence he has been pleading not guilty. He and we don’t have the strength to protect him in the court alone, hence our call for legal aid from human rights individuals and organizations to bring us succour.”
The group led by the State Chairman, Musa Santuraki Pali alleged, “We noticed that some of the sects who now ganged up to eliminate Abduljabbar were the ones who committed series of blasphemies in their preaching but nothing was done to them and they continue to practice their religion without hindrance.”
According to the group, “These blasphemers include Qaribu Kabara, Abdulrazak Yahya Haifan, Abbas Jega, Jalo Jalingo Ahmad Gumi, Abdulwahab Abdullah and Sani Rijiyar Lemo, but because they are close to people in power, they went scot free while our spiritual leader who is innocent is now facing persecution.”
The group claimed that the “judgment was politically processed by Governor Ganduje because he (Abduljabbar) was so critical of Governor Ganduje’s corruption and he did not support him.”
It concluded, stating, “Finally, the purported un-Islamic so-called judgment by Ibrahim Sarki Yola is totally wrong and un-Islamic, therefore we reject because the judgment was negatively manipulated from t beginning to the end.”
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