Al-Mustapha
Afenifere Renewal Group has decried the acquittal of the former Chief Security Officer to the former Head of State, late General Sani Abacha, Major Hamzat Al-Mustapha by the Court of Appeal, Lagos on Friday.
Major Al-Mustapha regained his freedom from the Kirikiri Maximum Prisons after 14 years of incarceration. He was sentenced to death by hanging on January 30, last year by Justice Mojisola Dada of the Lagos High Court, Igbosere alongside the former Personal Assistant to the late Kudirat Abiola, Lateef Shofolahan over the alleged murder of the wife of the winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election, Chief M.K.O. Abiola.
But in a surprise verdict, the upper court discharged and acquitted the duo, saying that the judgment of the lower court was baseless and unreasonable. The judgment by the three-man panel, read by Justice Rita Pemu, said the lower court drew inferences from the testimonies of Barnabas Jabila (Sergeant Rogers) and Muhammed Abdul (Kotako) to convict Al-Mustapha and Shofolahan.
But the Lagos State chapter of the group in a statement signed by Chief Supo Shonibare, condemned the Court Of Appeal’s verdict. “We are of the opinion that witnesses who had given evidence of the truth at the inception of the trial were instigated to contradict the evidence in a contrived attempt to render the evidence ineffective,” the group said.
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