The socio-cultural organization of indigenous ethnic nationalities of the Gongola region, the Gongola Peoples Forum (GPF), has begged Adamawa State Governor, Ahmadu Fintiri, to grant clemency to Sunday Jackson, a farmer on death row convicted of murdering a Fulani herdsman.
Jackson was working on his farm when the Fulani herdsman attacked him with a weapon. In the altercation, the farmer overpowered and subsequently killed his assailant.
President of the forum, Markus Gundiri, who appealed to Gov. Fintiri, to invoke Section 212 of the 1999 constitution, to exercise his powers under the prerogative of mercy to pardon Jackson, who has spent 10 years in jail since the incident occurred.
“It is pursuant to this provision that we are calling upon Gov. Ahmadu Fintiri to grant a pardon to Mr. Sunday Jackson and save him from the sentence of death by hanging.
“The extenuating circumstances which the law is blind to in this case are glaring. Jackson was going about his business of working to earn a living when the herder accosted him.
“Jackson was unarmed at the time of the encounter. The herder was the aggressor and had without any provocation from Jackson, attacked him with a dangerous weapon, and inflicted injuries upon him on the back of his head and leg.
“In the struggle that ensured, Jackson wrested the knife with which the herder attacked him, and inflicted blows on him that proved fatal.
“The court on these facts found that Jackson should have thrown away the knife and escaped from his assailant having disarmed him.
“That is the law. It is right even when it acts like an ass. Only the legislature can change it. The governor is the only one with the power to override it in this instance by exercising his prerogative of mercy,” he said.
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According to him, farmers/herders’ clashes are a recurrent decimal in communities in the Gongola valley, adding that Jackson’s case is one of those that turned bloody because he was determined to defend himself.
“We are therefore calling on Gov. Fintiri to save democracy and the rule of law from this legalistic manifestation of the law. Sunday Jackson comes from a very poor background but was hopeful that acting in self -defense on his farm was a just thing.
“Probably, if he had known that defending himself and his farm would earn him a death sentence, we are sure, he would have probably walked away.
“We call upon Gov. Fintiri to let Sunday Jackson breathe fresh air and live. We in GPF join the whole world to ask you to grant a state pardon to Sunday Jackson,” he pleaded.
