Facts have emerged
that the federal government’s apparent unwillingness to put book harm suspects
on trial is as a result of apprehension among judges, SUNDAY PUNCH has
gathered. The judges fear that they
and their families may become targets of attacks by members of the sect if they
appear before their courts.
Over 200 members of
the sect have been arrested in different parts of the country for offences
ranging from planting of explosive, jail breaks, attack against security agents
to disturbance of public peace.
One of the highly
placed sources said the judges initially claimed that the suspects could be
prosecuted because Nigerian had no terrorism laws.
He said, “when we
arrested the first batch of book of book
haram members last year, he judges openly told us that they could not accept
the cases because we didn’t have terrorism laws
The source further
said that even after President Goodluck Jonathan signed the anti-terrorism
bill into law, the judiciary was still reluctant to handle such cases.
He added, “we thought
the anti-terrorism law would make a way for the prosecution of the prosecution
of the Boko Haram suspects but the judges did not budge to handle such cases.
On June, 6, 2011, the
president signed the terrorism (prevention) Act 2011 which established measures
for the prevention, prohibition and combating of acts of terrorism and the
financing of terrorism.
The reluctance of the
judiciary to accept Boko Haram cases after the signing of the Terrorism Bill
into law has been deduced as one of the reasons the FG set up a committee to
negotiate with the sect.