Across the country, ‘jungle justice’ pops up so often, with citizens pouncing on other citizens on real, cooked up, or imaginary wrongs without the benefit of the established legal processes. The Ile-Ife atrocity and every other recent one should not go unpunished; the perpetrators must be apprehended swiftly and prosecuted to serve as a deterrent to mob justice.
The OAU case is commonplace; but it is even more worrisome that it occurred in a foremost academic citadel, the last place one would normally expect a descent into primordial savagery. Reports said the victim, Ahize Okoli, was savagely beaten by a mob at the institution’s Awolowo Hall of Residence on the allegation that he stole a mobile phone.
Another promising life was thus cut short in its prime; his aspirations, and the labour of his parents eagerly awaiting his graduation, terminated by his compatriots who constituted themselves into accusers, judges and executioners outside of the legal system. The late Okoli may have committed the crime, but it was not the place of a mob to dispense justice. But worse, proper investigation and due legal process may also have eventually exonerated him, making his demise doubly tragic.
Concerned individuals have called for an independent panel into the matter comprising the school authorities, student leaders, alumni, and other stakeholders. But first, the police should find the killers. Everyone involved in the primitive behaviour should account for their misdeeds.
Sorry are you a Nigerian citizen ?
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