The groundswell of comments trailing the discharge and acquittal of Al-Mustapha and Lateef Shofolahan does not seem to be letting up, as Director of Social Communications, Catholic Arch diocese of Lagos, Very Rev. Msgr. Gabriel Osu, has described the verdict as ‘an act of God.

WHEN the Court of Appeal overturned the death sentence passed on Major Hamza Al-Mustapha and Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan, setting two of them free, the nation was gripped by shock and disbelief.

HE knows PW2, Barnabas Jabila a.k.a. Sergeant Rogers. PW2 was serving in Jaji infanty centre and school, worked with the former head of state, Brigadier General Abdulsalam Abubakar closely, and this informed his nomination, that brought him to be a member of strike force into the Presidency.

Last Friday, the Court of Appeal, Lagos quashed the death sentence which Justice Mojisola Dada of the Lagos High Court handed Major Hamza Al-Mustapha and Alhaji Lateef Shofolahan over the death of Alhaja Kudirat Abiola. The appellate court said that the court below convicted the duo at all cost despite the prosecution’s failure to prove its case beyond reasonable doubt.

Below is the judgment as delivered by the appellate court.

KILL-AND-GO! That was the catch-phrase when the mobile police unit was first introduced in Nigeria about four decades ago. Because of the fiesty mien of the officers and men of that unit, they earned for themselves a reputation of no-nonsense.

Worse still, Nigerians were conditioned to believe that whenever the unit was deployed to quell riots, their rules of engagement differed from the civil, gentle and persuasive approach of the regular police. Indeed, people were left to go with the impression that whatever the officers and men of the unit did was not to be questioned. There was also the belief – for effect at that time – that if an officer of the mobile unit killed in the course of his duty, he would not be held accountable. And so they were named KILL-AND-GO.