Safiya Hussaini
Encyclopedia
Safiya Hussaini Tungar Tudu (born 1967) is a Nigeria
n woman condemned to death for adultery in 2002. She gave birth to a child as a single woman in Sokoto
, a Nigerian state under Sharia
law. She was sentenced to be stoned
but was acquitted of all charges in March 2002 after a retrial.
The verdict was wide and international protests inviting campaigns an petitions to release her. Halima Abdullahi, director of Help Eliminate Loneliness and Poverty, HELP, a non-governmental organisation, also faulted the verdict. In a statement she said “it was a thorough embarrassment” to majority of Nigerian Muslims. The group argued that the judgment was wrong because Safiya was accused of adultery instead of fornication, since she was a divorcee. Again, four witnesses stipulated by the Islamic law were not available at the trial. The verdict was passed because Safiya comes from an under-privileged class, the organisation argued. While describing the verdict as “gender discrimination of the highest order,” the group called on Governor Attahiru Bafarawa to intervene to save Safiya’s life.
Hussaini appealed and her lawyers argued that Hussaini's former husband was the father of her one-year-old daughter Adama and that the village woman made her original statement under duress.
Further they said the alleged act of adultery had taken place before the sharia law was implemented in the state. Full Sharia law was established in Sokoto in June 2000, a month after baby Adama was conceived. She was defended by Nigerian human rights
lawyer Hauwa Ibrahim
.
Hussaini won her appeal on March 25, 2002 and the case was dismissed. The Appeal Court in Sokoto found that the death sentence, originally handed down by an Islamic Sharia court in October, had been baseless. The court ruled that the adultery provisions of Sokoto's Sharia law could not be used against Safiya, as the alleged adultery must have taken place before the introduction of Sharia law in Sokoto.
Hussaini's plight was later recorded in the book, Safiya Hussaini Tungar Tudu: I, Safiya (2004).
Nigeria
Nigeria , officially the Federal Republic of Nigeria, is a federal constitutional republic comprising 36 states and its Federal Capital Territory, Abuja. The country is located in West Africa and shares land borders with the Republic of Benin in the west, Chad and Cameroon in the east, and Niger in...
n woman condemned to death for adultery in 2002. She gave birth to a child as a single woman in Sokoto
Sokoto
Sokoto is a city located in the extreme northwest of Nigeria, near to the confluence of the Sokoto River and the Rima River. As of 2006 it has a population of 427,760...
, a Nigerian state under Sharia
Sharia
Sharia law, is the moral code and religious law of Islam. Sharia is derived from two primary sources of Islamic law: the precepts set forth in the Quran, and the example set by the Islamic prophet Muhammad in the Sunnah. Fiqh jurisprudence interprets and extends the application of sharia to...
law. She was sentenced to be stoned
Stoning
Stoning, or lapidation, is a form of capital punishment whereby a group throws stones at a person until the person dies. No individual among the group can be identified as the one who kills the subject, yet everyone involved plainly bears some degree of moral culpability. This is in contrast to the...
but was acquitted of all charges in March 2002 after a retrial.
Background
Hussaini, a divorced mother of four, was sentenced to death by stoning in October 2001 for allegedly having a child with a married neighbour. She had the child after her divorce. Hussaini said, she was the victim of repeated rape by a man, who the Sharia court found not guilty due to lack of sufficient evidence. During the trial, Hussaini had no legal representation and was not informed of her legal rights. The Sokoto court dismissed her testimony and convicted her on 12 October 2001.The verdict was wide and international protests inviting campaigns an petitions to release her. Halima Abdullahi, director of Help Eliminate Loneliness and Poverty, HELP, a non-governmental organisation, also faulted the verdict. In a statement she said “it was a thorough embarrassment” to majority of Nigerian Muslims. The group argued that the judgment was wrong because Safiya was accused of adultery instead of fornication, since she was a divorcee. Again, four witnesses stipulated by the Islamic law were not available at the trial. The verdict was passed because Safiya comes from an under-privileged class, the organisation argued. While describing the verdict as “gender discrimination of the highest order,” the group called on Governor Attahiru Bafarawa to intervene to save Safiya’s life.
Hussaini appealed and her lawyers argued that Hussaini's former husband was the father of her one-year-old daughter Adama and that the village woman made her original statement under duress.
Further they said the alleged act of adultery had taken place before the sharia law was implemented in the state. Full Sharia law was established in Sokoto in June 2000, a month after baby Adama was conceived. She was defended by Nigerian human rights
Human rights
Human rights are "commonly understood as inalienable fundamental rights to which a person is inherently entitled simply because she or he is a human being." Human rights are thus conceived as universal and egalitarian . These rights may exist as natural rights or as legal rights, in both national...
lawyer Hauwa Ibrahim
Hauwa Ibrahim
Hauwa Ibrahim is a Nigerian human rights lawyer who won the European Parliament's Sakharov Prize in 2005. She was especially cited for her pro bono work defending people condemned under the Islamic Sharia laws that are in force in the northern Nigerian provinces, including her defence of Amina...
.
Hussaini won her appeal on March 25, 2002 and the case was dismissed. The Appeal Court in Sokoto found that the death sentence, originally handed down by an Islamic Sharia court in October, had been baseless. The court ruled that the adultery provisions of Sokoto's Sharia law could not be used against Safiya, as the alleged adultery must have taken place before the introduction of Sharia law in Sokoto.
Hussaini's plight was later recorded in the book, Safiya Hussaini Tungar Tudu: I, Safiya (2004).
External links
- Nigerian Woman Condemned to Death by Stoning Is Acquitted - New York TimesThe New York TimesThe New York Times is an American daily newspaper founded and continuously published in New York City since 1851. The New York Times has won 106 Pulitzer Prizes, the most of any news organization...
(2002-3-26) - Nigeria: warning over Sharia courts after Safiya Hussaini Acquittal Amnesty International, 25 March 2002.
- Nigerian Woman Avoids Stoning Death
- Muslim woman spared death by stoning in Nigeria
- Safiya Hussaini case
- Safiya Hussaini Tungar-Tudu sits in a jail cell in Nigeria facing a death sentence