Nigeria: Soyinka Demands Accountability for Extrajudicial Killings in Nigeria

What the report says

Nobel laureate Wole Soyinka has called on President Bola Tinubu to revisit unresolved cases of assassinations and extrajudicial killings in Nigeria, saying accountability is needed to rebuild confidence in the justice system. The remarks were reported by Premium Times and distributed by AllAfrica. Soyinka made the appeal on Friday in Port Harcourt, Rivers State, during the 28th Wole Soyinka Lecture, which was organized by the National Association of Seadogs and marked its annual Martyrs’ Day.

According to the report, Soyinka argued that Nigeria has long faced unlawful arrests, arbitrary detention, unresolved killings and weak follow-through in cases involving victims and their families. He said the justice system must not allow a pattern of impunity in which human life is treated as disposable. He also urged Tinubu to make public any findings from files on unresolved cases that were reportedly requested after he took office in 2023.

Soyinka specifically referenced the killing of Deborah Samuel, a student at Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto State, who was lynched in 2022 after accusations that she insulted the Prophet of Islam. He described the case as one of the country’s unresolved tragedies and used it to illustrate what he called a serious justice deficit. The report says he rejected claims that raising such issues was meant to inflame religious or ethnic tensions.

The lecture also featured former Aviation Minister Osita Chidoka, who said justice begins at the stage of complaints and policing, while Timi Alaibe, the event chairman, pointed to weak institutions and poor accountability as barriers to national development.