Immediately after Lt. Felix Olanrewaju Odunlami squeezed the trigger of his service pistol, firing 9mm bullet at his target, the attention of a huge crowd of bystanders was drawn. The crowd suddenly metamorphosed into a lynch mob.
One morning in July 2005, Lt. Odunlami drove through the Lagos' traffic snarl from the State Secretariat, Alausa to Apapa. At Allen Roundabout, Ikeja, an Okada rider bashed his car. Furious about the dent on his car, the naval officer unsheathed his gun from the holster. The Okada rider, Mr Peter Edeh, abandoned his bike and knelt down before Lt. Odunlami pleading for mercy. Edeh's plea fell on deaf ears as Lt. Odunlami shot him point blank in the mouth. Mr Edeh died instantly.
The military officer's action therefore drew the ire of the crowd who set aflame Odunlami's overprotected car and attempted to lynch him. The police, quite unlike them, arrived at the scene immediately and rescued Odunlami from the mob.
In its tradition, the military subjected Lt. Odunlami to General Court Martial, and charged him with "manslaughter, loss of service item (for inability to account for four rounds of 9mm live ammunition) and conduct prejudice of service discipline". The offences are punishable under sections 68(1)(a), 103(i) AFA 105 and 106 of the Armed Forces Act Cap A 20 laws of Nigeria. At the end of the military trial in July 2006, THISDAY reported that "the Court Martial convicted him on counts one and two. The court sentenced him to life imprisonment for manslaughter and dismissed him from service on count two."
But despite the fact that the court martial didn't sentence him to death, Odunlami headed to Court of Appeal, praying that he be acquitted. After the appellate court upheld the decision of the Court Martial, the officer rushed to Supreme Court, which, to his chagrin, also upheld the decision of the Court of Appeal.
On May 14, 2014 when some Nigerian soldiers in the newly-established 7th Division fired shots at the car of their General Officer Commanding (GOC), Major General Ahmadu Muhammad, for allowing their colleagues to fall into Boko Haram trap and suffer casualty, the soldiers were charged with mutiny.
PREMIUM TIMES reported that "the aggrieved soldiers blamed the death of their colleagues on the military hierarchy in the division". Quoting sources in the military, the online news medium said "the dead soldiers and the survivors were ambushed while on a special operation in Kalabalge Local Government Area where locals had on Tuesday morning killed about 150 insurgents and arrested 10 others. After the operation, during which some military equipment were recovered from the insurgents, the soldiers who had arrived (at) the council (area), were asked to return to Maiduguri."
Sensing the impeding danger, the soldiers requested their superiors to allow them pass the night in the area, and return to Maiduguri the following morning. The superiors turned down the request and insisted they return to the base. Midway into the night journey, Boko Haram ambushed and killed 12 soldiers among them.
After Boko Haram murdered 12 soldiers, it appears the Nigerian Army too is following suit by sentencing 12 soldiers to death for protesting the killing of their colleagues by Boko Haram.
Now I am wondering, after finding the 12 guilty of "three charges of conspiracy, mutiny and attempted murder of Major General Mohammed, I wondered why the same court martial did not sentence Lt. Odunlami to death for killing Okada rider in 2005. I also wondered what punishment did the court meted out on the GOC, whose wrong order led to the death of 12 gallant soldiers. He was sentenced to 'redeployment'. I was expecting to see General Muhammad and other top commanders being tried for giving the ruinous order that led to Nigerian army suffering the casualty. Naught! I'm bemused, seriously. I quizzed myself severally. Does this mean by attempting to kill a soldier, you get a death sentence but by killing Okada rider you only get a life sentence? So life of an Okada rider is not a life. It's just like killing a stray goat, huh?
Issues of court martial and Sharia law under the Nigerian constitution always baffle me. I am not a fan of Nigeria's politico-doctrinal contraption called Sharia. But if the decision of Sharia court regarding apostasy or adultery can be reversed by the upper courts on the premise that the constitution does not regard them as capital offenses, the decision of the court martial regarding the 12 soldiers should also be looked into. Thank God the condemned soldiers have appealed their case.
Similar instance occurred in 2009 when Brigadier-General Ishaya Bauka-led court martial sentenced 27 Nigerian soldiers who returned from UN peacekeeping in Liberia to life imprisonment for protesting the non-payment of their peacekeeping allowances. What sentence did the court martial pass on the senior officers who stowed away in their pockets the allowances of protesting soldiers? They were only 'sentenced' to demotion!
But military brutality is not new to Nigerians. On slight infraction, Nigerians are killed, maimed, tortured, threatened, abused, raped or molested by those responsible for protecting us from being killed, maimed, tortured, threatened, abused, raped or molested. Nearly 20 years ago, a young man named Auwalu in Brigade area of Kano was beaten to death by a DPO. The DPO, bearing the monicker 'Kwanta Kwanta' because of his brutality, was notorious for torturing suspects. In order to seek justice, the father of the murdered young man left the body in the mortuary for years, writing all manner of petitions and traversing all manner of courts, including the Oputa Panel, in search of justice. To the best of my knowledge, the highest punishment Kwanta Kwanta received was redeployment to South.
Nigerian law is always funny. It jails pickpockets and sets free a person who steals billions. Terrorism, to me, is greater than mutiny. You may disagree. But before you charge me with mutiny, let me ask you this question: who between notorious Boko Haram kingpin Ali Sanda Konduga and 12 mutinying soldiers deserve death sentence? Konduga, onetime spokesman of Boko Haram, was jailed for only three years! Only two days ago, the Federal High Court in Lagos sentenced three Boko Haram members to 25 years imprisonment each. Not life sentence, let alone death sentence! Again, earlier through the trial, The Nation reported, the Attorney General of the federation had entered a nolle prosequi (do not prosecute) in respect of two of Boko Haram members, and were subsequently discharged. "Later (on), another 11 were also discharged in the course of the trial following another nolle prosequi by the prosecution", said the newspaper. What kind of country is Nigeria?!
I remember reading an editorial in the heat of Lt. Odunlami's killing of the Okada man in one of the Nigerian dailies, faulting the court martial's decision of sentencing the young officer to life imprisonment instead of handing down a death sentence on him. If my memory serves me right, the editorialists (perhaps bearing in mind the nature of Nigeria) argued that sentencing the officer to life imprisonment was a tactical way of preparing him for pardon and gaining freedom after serving a few years.
The manner with which criminals are pardoned and thieves are honoured with National Merit Award, I wonder if Lt. Odunlami hasn't been surreptitiously pardoned and allowed to jet out of the country.