Alhaji Atiku Abubakar, the PDP presidential candidate, has provided an explanation for why he removed the tweet that denounced the May 12 murder of Deborah Samuel by religious extremists at a school in Sokoto for alleged blasphemy.
On May 12, Muslim classmates of Miss Deborah Yakubu, a second-year female student at Shehu Shagari College of Education in Sokoto, killed and set her ablaze for allegedly insulting the Prophet Mohammed on WhatsApp.
Atiku responded to the incident by condemning the murder and calling for its perpetrators to be apprehended in a post on his verified twitter account @Atiku.
He tweeted: “There cannot be a justification for such gruesome murder. Deborah Yakubu was murdered, and all those behind her death must be brought to justice.
“My condolences to her family and friends.”
Some muslims saw the tweet, and condemned Atiku’s position threatening to not vote for him.
Atiku’s post was taken down within minutes. In response to this, Nigerians accused him of caring more about votes than Nigerian lives and criticized him for deleting the tweet.
On Sunday, December 11, Atiku explained that he deleted the tweet about Deborah’s murder because he hadn’t given it the necessary approval before it was posted. He made this statement during a Channels TV town hall meeting.
The PDP presidential candidate stated that he denounced the murder because it was obviously committed in violation of Islamic tenets.
Watch video below:
Why I deleted tweet on Deborah Samuel’s lynching – Atiku opens up#CristianoRonaldo #asake pic.twitter.com/VV1VsLGJaa
— All Naija Trends (@AllNaija_Trends) December 12, 2022
