SOKOTO – Details have emerged about the vain plea for mercy and last words of Christian female student, Miss Deborah Yakubu (better known as Deborah Samuel), who was murdered in cold blood by Muslim schoolmates on Thursday, May 12, 2022, over alleged blasphemy.
Deborah Samuel, a 200-level Home Economics student of Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto, was on Thursday said to have made a comment in her school’s WhatsApp platform which her Muslim colleagues considered blasphemous of Prophet Mohammed (SAW) and killed her before setting her corpse ablaze.
A report this morning by Saturday Vanguard revealed Deborah’s last words as recounted by one of the students of the college, “who witnessed how Deborah was flogged, killed, and burnt described the scene as the most horrible she has ever witnessed.”
The student who identified herself simply as Rakia, gave an account of how the voice note of the 25-year-old student degenerated into an uncontrollable situation.
Speaking from her parents’ home in Gidan Kaya area of Sokoto State, the visibly shaken student said, “Deborah was my course mate. I just stepped into the class when the uproar on her voice note started,” Saturday Vanguard reported.
It quoted Rakia as saying of Doborah’s cruel murder that has attracted global outrage: “It was her own course mates that started it. One of them said Deborah dared them by refusing to apologise when she was asked to. It all started with a debate on the upcoming examination on a general WhatsApp platform created for our course mates. One of the students asked her how she passed the last semester’s examination and in response, she said it was ‘Jesus o’.
“Immediately, about three other chats came in from two Muslims and one Christian, telling her to retract the statement. Two students from other departments who overheard some Muslim boys discussing the matter told Deborah’s close friends to prevail on her to retract the statement. But she replied via a voice note on the platform ‘Holy Ghost fire. Nothing will happen to me.
“ ‘Is it by force that you guys will always be sending this religious stuff in this group? The group wasn’t created for that but rather as a notice on test, assignment, exam, etc, not this nonsense religious posts’.
“We were made to understand that some young men were brought from outside before the outrage. I was in class when some of our course mates rushed in, saying ‘there is fire on the mountain o’.
“The Muslim students led the strangers to the class to look for her. In fear, those in the class tried to help her escape and took her to the security post from where they hoped to create a way for her to run outside Already, a cab was waiting outside to drive her straight to the police station. Unfortunately, the mob overpowered everyone who tried to save her. They even threatened to kill anyone who attempted to stand in their way.
“She was dragged out, flogged and stoned. The last word in her mouth was ‘what do you hope to achieve with this?’ By then some of our course mates were making calls to some of our lecturers to save the situation. At a point, all the Christian students fled the school premises. It was when I got home that I heard she was set ablaze. Since the incident, I have been having a flash of her pleading expression. She pleaded for mercy and called out for help but it was far from her. What a cruel way to die.”
Another Muslim student in the report who did not want her name in print kicked against the mob action on the late Deborah. She said: “What happened did not warrant her death. We are calling on the government to make a policy that kicks against attack on anyone accused of blasphemy”.
