Field tracker · Nigeria · Sub-Saharan Africa

AFRICA/NIGERIA - Bishop of Ondo after the conviction of four jihadists for the Pentecost massacre: “There is a law in this country”

Abuja – Four people have been sentenced to death for the massacre that took place four years ago, on June 5, 2022, at St. Francis Xavier Church in Owo, Ondo State . Idris Abdulmalik Omeiza, 25, Al Qasim Idris, 20, Jamiu Abdulmalik, 26, and Abdulhaleem Idris, 25, were sentenced to death by hanging by the Federal Court in Abuja on nine charges, including hostage-taking, kidnapping, financing terrorism, detonating explosives resulting in death and injury. A fifth suspect, Momoh Otuho Abubakar, was acquitted for lack of evidence, despite being found in possession of a large sum of money whose origin he could not explain. The investigation was conducted by the Nigerian Department of State Security . Eleven people testified at the trial. The four convicted men, who initially maintained their innocence, later voluntarily confessed to carrying out the attack after their leader, who remains at large, told them that the Catholic Church was committing blasphemy by insulting the Prophet Muhammad. They stated that they had received explicit orders to kill the priest who survived the attack. According to facts revealed at the trial, the defendants joined the Somali jihadist group Al-Shabaab in 2021. Al-Shabaab, however, has not claimed responsibility for the June 2022 attack, and its operational presence in Nigeria remains unclear. The Islamic State of West Africa , a splinter group of the Nigerian group Boko Haram, has also never claimed responsibility for the Pentecost Sunday massacre, in which over 40 people were killed and more than 100 injured. Bishop Jude Ayodeji Arogundade of Ondo commented on the verdict, saying, “Some level of justice was done. But at the same time, it doesn’t bring back the lives of 41 people that were brutally murdered on that day. So my reaction is, well, we have a law in this country. The law may have taken its course, but we are left to continue to nurse the wounds of those who are scarred by that attack,” he added. The death penalty is rarely carried out in Nigeria, so it is likely that the four death sentences will be commuted to life imprisonment.

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