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Nigeria girl faces murder trial over forced marriage

Aug 4, 2014 4:46 pm By Robert Spencer

NigeriangirlsOne can only imagine Wasila Tasi’u’s fear and desperation. There is no justification for murder, but Nigeria does need to have a public discussion about the influence of Sharia in society and law, and the rights of young girls like Wasila who are victimized and their lives destroyed because of Sharia provisions.

“Nigeria girl faces murder trial over forced marriage,” by Aminu Abubakar, AFP, August 4, 2014 (thanks to Block Ness):

Gezawa (Nigeria) (AFP) – A Nigerian court on Monday postponed the murder trial of a 14-year-old girl accused of poisoning the 35-year-old man she was forced to marry, a case that has thrown the spotlight on the influence of Islamic law in region.

Wasila Tasi’u has also been charged with the murder of three others who allegedly ate the food laced with rat poison that she prepared and served in April this year, a week after her marriage to Umaru Sani.

“Wasila was to appear today,” but the case has been postponed indefinitely because of a backlog caused by a judicial staff strike, said Salisu Yakubu, registrar at the High Court in town of Gezawa.

Police say Tasi’u confessed to poisoning Sani and his guests at the wedding party in the village of Unguwar Yansoro village, about 60 kilometres (40 miles) outside Nigeria’s second city of Kano.

“She did it because she was forced by her parents to marry a man she did not love,” Kano state police spokesman Musa Magaji Majia told AFP.

Her lawyer Hussaina Aliyu rejects claims that her client made a legally valid confession.

She said Tasi’u was questioned by police without a parent or lawyer present and so any comments she may have made are inadmissable in court.

Aliyu, who works with International Federation of Women Lawyers (FIDA), has sought to have the case transferred to a juvenile court, a bid rejected by justice officials in Kano.

“All we are saying is do justice to her. Treat the case as it is. Treat her as a child,” Aliyu said.

The marriage of teenage girls to much older men is rampant in deeply conservative, mainly Muslim northern Nigeria, especially in poorer rural areas.

The region has since 2000 been under sharia Islamic law which some say does not prohibit the marriage of underage girls.

Under Nigeria’s marriage act, which applies nationwide, a woman under the age of 21 who wants to marry must have the consent of her parents.

With that consent there is no minimum marrying age, including in the Christian south, “which is very, very unfortunate,” said human rights lawyer Festus Keyamo.

But cases of underage marriage are rare in the south, and the Tasi’u case has called attention to the confusing hybrid legal system in the north, where the secular criminal code is unevenly applied as police and prosecutors try to strike a balance with sharia provisions.

Jiti Ogunye, another rights lawyer, said sharia was irrelevant in the Tasi’u case.

“A girl of 14 cannot stand trial under the criminal code. This case is just adding to our country’s negative reputation in the eyes of the international community,” he told AFP.

He called on Kano authorities to immediately dismiss the charges and start treating Tasi’u as a victim, noting the possibility she was raped by the man she was ordered to marry.

“Rather than talking about making her liable for an alleged crime, Kano state should be rehabilitating her. She is a victim,” he added.

The issue of child marriage has been fiercely debated in Nigeria over the past year, sparked by a proposal from a northern lawmaker that any girl, regardless of her age, should be legally considered an adult with full citizenship rights.

The senator who floated the proposal, Ahmed Yerima of Zamfara state, had reportedly married a 13-year-old Egyptian girl and wanted her to become a Nigerian citizen.

The measure from Yerima, also an ex-governor of northwestern Zamfara, has not become law, but the proposal was intensely criticised by activists who say Nigeria should not permit any application of sharia, even in the north.

Defence lawyer Aliyu said the case should not be a debate about youth marriage in a Muslim society.

She supported Ogunye’s argument that regardless of religion or region, a child cannot face criminal charges in a high court and the case must be moved to the juvenile system.

“She is still a child,” the lawyer said.

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Filed Under: Nigeria, Sharia, women's rights in Islam Tagged With: featured


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Comments

  1. Diane Harvey says

    Aug 4, 2014 at 5:18 pm

    Robert, you state, “There is no justification for murder.”

    True enough. But are we really dealing with a murder as legally understood.

    What this girl did was certainly a homicide, but was it murder?

    Murder is a sub-category of homicide. Included among homicide’s other sub-categories is self-defense for which there can be justification. Justification is a legal term. Under American law she would have a clear defense. Don’t know if the same concepts are available under Nigerian law.

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 10:20 am

      Agreed, Diane. Of course, this distinction will not help little Wasila in a Shari’ah court.

  2. jewdog says

    Aug 4, 2014 at 5:38 pm

    Good for her, and rat poison was appropriate. It’s a clear-cut case of self-defense. Next.

    • Beagle says

      Aug 4, 2014 at 6:21 pm

      Not entirely clear-cut but I agree. I think this is her biggest problem:

      “Wasila Tasi’u has also been charged with the murder of three others who allegedly ate the food laced with rat poison”

      As to her child-raping husband who had enslaved her, no problem. But sadly, as we all know here, enslaving and child rape is part of sharia.

      • jewdog says

        Aug 4, 2014 at 7:01 pm

        “Wasila Tasi’u has also been charged with the murder of three others who allegedly ate the food laced with rat poison”
        -Collateral damage caused by defending from rape. I hope they were friends of her husband-rapist.

  3. Tradewinds says

    Aug 4, 2014 at 7:20 pm

    This is how Muhammad died. A Jewish woman whose husband Mo had killed poisoned his goat stew. That’s what I’ve heard, anyway.

    • Salah says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 12:53 am

      You’re right. Here’s the full story according to the most reliable islamic texts:

      http://crossmuslims.blogspot.com/2011/03/muhammads-death.html

      • Tradewinds says

        Aug 5, 2014 at 8:38 am

        The Jewish woman is a real hero. She killed Mohamet, who unleashed evil Islam upon the world.

  4. JIMJFOX says

    Aug 4, 2014 at 7:24 pm

    “where the secular criminal code is unevenly applied as police and prosecutors try to strike a balance with sharia provisions”

    strike a balance with sharia- good luck with that…

    • Michael Copeland says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 2:49 am

      “where the secular criminal code is unevenly applied”.
      That sounds like the UK.

  5. medina says

    Aug 4, 2014 at 11:13 pm

    There may be no justification for murder, but there is certainly an explanation and some understanding of what drove this act. Imagine the girl in a powerless situation where she was undoubtedly raped, and lived a life of servitude. You can say that women under Islam know nothing more and expect this life. Or you can know that the universal yearning for all people is to be free, and some people will kill for it. Dying on your feet vs living on your knees or something.

  6. The Vilest Of Creatures says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 12:05 am

    Gee, sure didn’t take long for the media, our politicians and the leftist elite to forget about “#Bringing back our girls”!

  7. Jan Fourowls says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 1:06 am

    Because re: “#Bringing back our girls,” as Michelle with her Harvard Law education must be starting to realize, under the Islam so beloved by her husband the POTUS, girls and women never really matter except as breeding stock and target practice. Michelle has only produced girls and therefore in the New Islamic States of America she can expect her husband to add the other three wives allowed by the Quran. Just what the world needs — more male fakers and pro-terrorists in the lineage of Barack Hussein Obama II and Malik Obama.

    Actually, the world needs instead what Jesus Christ promised and the Jews and Christians will ultimately inherit after some even weirder end times whose trajectory is up for interpretation and not an article of faith in either of the two Abrahamic religions.

    No, (A) there are not really three Abrahamic religions just because Islam pretends to the title by Muhammad’s 7th century invention, (B) Islam is not really a religion but an excuse for genocide and conquest, and (C) that’s so even if misguided Jews and Christians want to embrace misguided interfaith equivalency because they’re ignorant or have been bribed (maybe threatened). Regular JW readers of course know this; I’m stating it mainly for any Muslims reading here who might rather enjoy eternity with the real God, not Allah who will be in hell with all who have unrepentantly done horrible things like rape little girls and cause them in deranged PTSD desperation to kill in self-defense.

  8. Gail Griffin says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 1:34 am

    Wishful thinking here; I wish that these children could be tried as children and get off. Yes the girls get rapef but the dickheads get dead. And what about mum and dad? Consperies.

  9. Rezali Mehil says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 5:31 am

    All,

    This is more or less how that traitor jewess wife murdered Muhammed SAW.
    Her husband would have called his friends over to celebrate his marriage and wanted to SHOW OFF his new wife…and this is the way she treats them.

    The nikkah is a contract ….Each woman gets the choice in front of an Imam …to say yes or no ….if it is a no then the marriage cannot go ahead…you ALL know this as does Robert Spencer….stop this lies.

    She needs for the Nigerian state law for murder to apply to her….nobody is above the law ….it is not as she didn’t now what she was doing.

    She and her ilk are a danger to mankind everywhere…..the sentence needs to take this into consideration.

    More Later ….

    Rezali

    • Keith says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 6:44 am

      And if at the age of 13 or 14 she really understands what she is being sent into she says no before the Imam so no marriage takes place. She is then honour killed by her family for bringing shame on them after they have agreed to marry her off against her will to someone she doesn’t love.
      People like her are a danger to your perverted religion and not to people in general.

      • Rezali Mehil says

        Aug 5, 2014 at 7:50 am

        Keith ….

        You say …”she says no before the Imam so no marriage takes place. She is then honour killed by her family” …blah blah…

        All decrepit assumptions…you don’t know whether that would be true or at all….

        More than likely she had a boyfriend and could not accept being separated from him…it’s probably HIS idea….

        More Later ….

        Rezali

        • Keith says

          Aug 5, 2014 at 8:58 am

          Heard it all before, members of your perverted religion only ever say that everyone else is in the wrong everyone should make allowances for them well now we have Islam in the west we are even starting to see honour killings here in the UK. It isn’t Christians, Jews, Buddhists and Sikhs who are honour killing but Muslims. All because the family doesn’t like what the girl has done. What is wrong with 2 young people being in love and wanting to be together. What right have the parents got to sell their daughter to someone she does not love because that what it amounts to. Maybe people like you should try loving someone you might be a bit more understanding of how others feel. Of course your religion doesn’t allow that does it?

    • sammy says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 6:53 am

      Rezali Mehil @
      Non of your (false) prophets wives were asked whether they wanted to marry him, he just took what he wanted, with no questions asked. Such is Islamic law, based on a self proclaimed prophet, whose only thoughts were on serving his own selfish needs first.

      • Rezali Mehil says

        Aug 5, 2014 at 7:41 am

        Sammy,

        We are not talking about the prophet SAW…we are talking about this 14 year retard….keep up

        More Later….

        Rezali

        • duh_swami says

          Aug 5, 2014 at 8:27 am

          It was you who brought up the ‘prophet’…Some people just hate being sold into slavery, and will take strong counter measures. Mahound would not have been poisoned if he was acting as a human. When you choose to act like a jinn, jinn type things happen to you.

        • sammy says

          Aug 5, 2014 at 9:34 am

          ….Each woman gets the choice in front of an Imam …to say yes or no

          No she doesn’t, following the practice of your prophet, this is not the case, as the man has the final say, not the woman.
          Silence means consent, remember!

    • gravenimage says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 11:42 am

      The repulsive Rezali Mehil wrote:

      All,

      This is more or less how that traitor jewess wife murdered Muhammed SAW.
      ………………………………….

      As this pious Muslimah sees it, a woman is supposed to be “loyal” to her Muslim rapist and the killer of her family. If she is not, then she is a “traitor”.

      And here she is comparing this would-be rapist of a child in this story to the “Prophet”. And why not? Mohammed was a child-rapist, as well.

      More, in reply to Sammy:

      Sammy,

      We are not talking about the prophet SAW…we are talking about this 14 year retard….keep up
      ………………………………….

      Duh Swami is quite correct that it was Rezali Mehil herself who compared this pious Muslim forcing himself on a child to the baleful “Prophet”.

      And notice how she characterizes the victim of a forced marriage—as a “retard”. *Ugh*.

      More:

      Her husband would have called his friends over to celebrate his marriage and wanted to SHOW OFF his new wife…and this is the way she treats them.
      ………………………………….

      She’s supposed to make the man who forcibly “married” her look good…

      More:

      The nikkah is a contract ….Each woman gets the choice in front of an Imam …to say yes or no ….if it is a no then the marriage cannot go ahead…you ALL know this as does Robert Spencer….stop this (sic) lies.
      ………………………………….

      The Nikkah *Is* a contract—between men. The girl’s current ‘owner’—typically her father—sells the right to her “Awra” (vagina) to her bridegroom.

      As for the “bride”, as Muhammed himself said, “silence equals consent”.

      More:

      She needs for the Nigerian state law for murder to apply to her….nobody is above the law ….it is not as she didn’t now what she was doing.
      ………………………………….

      This is not “Nigerian state law”—this is Shari’ah, which Mohammedans have imposed in the states where they have the majority.

      In Iran a nine-year-old girl is considered an “adult”—and why not? If she is old enough to rape, she is old enough to put on trial…

      More:

      She and her ilk are a danger to mankind everywhere…..the sentence needs to take this into consideration.
      ………………………………….

      Her example is an danger to *child rapists everywhere*—in other words, potentially every Muslim male. Really, we can’t have any threat to sacralized Muslim pedophilia and forced marriage, can we?

      More, in reply to Keith:

      You say …”she says no before the Imam so no marriage takes place. She is then honour killed by her family” …blah blah…

      All decrepit assumptions…you don’t know whether that would be true or at all….
      ………………………………….

      Actually, “Honor Killings” in the case of a girl who resists forced marriage is *enormously common* in Islam.

      Not only that, but Rezali Mehil herself has many times both lauded “Honor” murderers and shown sympathy for them as the “real victims*—so she is being entirely disingenuous here.

      More:

      More than likely she had a boyfriend and could not accept being separated from him…it’s probably HIS idea….
      ………………………………….

      Why would Rezali Mehil say this, when there is no evidence for it? She has said it before, even in the case of *very* young children.

      There are several reasons: firstly, this is assert that the child is already sexualized—even if she is only eight years old.

      It also implies that no little girl would fear sex—because she is already contemplating it.

      Then, it is to imply that if the little slut isn’t “married” off to some old man, that she will be off rutting in the bushes on the way to grade school, bringing shame on her family.

      It also implies that ‘having a boyfriend’ is the *only* reason that she would resist being “married” off to an old man.

      And finally, it completely negates the factor of love—if the victim cares for someone, then she is a slut who should be forcibly “married” to some man who can buy her for a higher price.

      And that is because there is no love—and no mercy—in Islam. *Ugh*.

    • medina says

      Aug 5, 2014 at 3:59 pm

      A “retard?” You are calling this child victim a retard?

      When I hear that word I envision the drones in Mecca rotating around a piece of space trash…mindless rubes who face downward toward Satan to whom they pray.

      How’s that scar tissue, Rezi?

  10. duh_swami says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 8:29 am

    Sometimes, what appears to be murder, is actually self defense.

  11. that african gurl says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 8:42 am

    first of all Nigeria is not an islamic state, so when you’re talking about Nigeria be specific about the region. nobody is getting married early in my region except she deliberately got pregnant for the dude and then its still up to her if she wants to be a single mom or raise the child alone because where I am from in Nigeria we are 92% christian and 8% traditionalist. I haven’t heard of anyone being “arranged” for anyone in years. yeah… sharia/culture is a big problem in the north while in the south, we’re getting too “westernized” for even religion. check out the growing population of atheist, agnostics and swaying umdecideds’

  12. that african gurl says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 8:49 am

    I wrote an epistle but it was not published. the biggest mistake Pres. Obasanjo made was allowing Sharia courts in the north. Its absolutely contradicts our constitution. patiently waiting till 2015.

  13. that african gurl says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 9:21 am

    sorry. lot of typos. omit “alone” etc

  14. Margaritha says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 9:35 am

    Judging from the dresses these girls are wearing, Boko Haram is financed by rich Saudi Arabians. Wonder why Obama never ever utter a single word regarding these poor captured girls-is it just because they are Christian? His hated towaards Christians and Jews are quite obvious.

  15. VLParker says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 12:41 pm

    This is self-defense, not murder. This girl has a right to chose her life’s path. When you are a victim of a kidnapping you have every right to use deadly force to escape your captivity.

  16. VLParker says

    Aug 5, 2014 at 12:43 pm

    I see this as no different than being a prisoner of war. Do whatever it takes to escape.

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