A Kano State High Court, Monday, heard the testimony of a 14-year-old girl, Wasila Tasi’u, who is on trial for killing her 35-year-old husband, Umar Sani, days after an allegedly forced marriage in Unguwar Yansoro village, at Gaya Local Government Area, near the city of Kano.
Wasila, while giving her testimony, admitted to killing her husband with rat poison, after which she signed a police confession with a thumbprint because she cannot write.
Homicide investigator, Abdullahi Adamu translated her statement from the Hausa language because the girl could not express herself in English. She could not even write her name.
Nigerian prosecutors, who are seeking the death penalty, also called out Wasila’s co-wife, identified as Ramatu.
According to her, she and the 14-year-old got along well and they had prepared the food together on April 5, the day Sani died. The girl however had to serve their husband’s meal because it was her turn to share his bed.
“After putting the food in the dish, I did not see anybody put anything in it,” Ramatu said, adding that later, her husband was helped back to the house by a neighbour, unable to walk and foaming at the mouth.
With the case generating controversy in different quarters and several activists blaming the parents for forcing the teenager into marrying early, the affected families have denied that Wasila was forced into marriage, arguing that girls across the impoverished region marry at 14 and that Tasi’u and Sani followed the traditional system of courtship.
The law may not play in Wasila’s favour as her parents seem certain to stand by their position that she was not forced into marrying Umar. According to Nigeria’s marriage act, anyone under 21 can marry provided they have parental consent.
Defence lawyer Hussaina Aliyu however maintained that under criminal law, a 14-year-old cannot be charged with murder in a high court. She has therefore demanded that the case be moved to a juvenile court.
The police had said Wasila confessed to committing the crime and said she did it because she was forced to marry a man she did not love.
Child marriage is common in Nigeria’s North, with several elites also indulging in a practice they claim is in line with the Sharia law. Aljazeera in 2010 reported that Senator Sani Ahmed Yerima paid $100,000 as dowry for a 13-year-old Egyptian girl.
“The Prophet Mohammed married at the age of nine, therefore any Muslim who marries a girl of nine years and above, is following the teachings of the Prophet,” Yerima told Al Jazeera at the time.
“If there’s anybody who’ll tell me that what you did contradicts Islam, I ‘ll submit – and I’ll do whatever they ask me to do.”
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