Nigerian woman continues to try to overturn death-by-stoning sentence

Jet, Sept 15, 2003

A tearful 32-year-old woman cuddled and nursed her toddler in an Islamic appeals court as lawyers recently pleaded she be spared death by stoning for having sex outside marriage.

"I've never been this afraid," Amina Lawal said, tears rolling down her face as she made her way past police ringing the courthouse in northern Nigeria's Katsina state. "I'm tired of all this."

The divorced woman was convicted of having sex outside marriage earlier this year by an Islamic court following the birth of her daughter, Wasila, out of wedlock (JET, April 14). The young girl is now nearly 2.

An Islamic court convicted Lawal following the birth of her baby, more than two years after Lawal and her husband divorced. The alleged father of the baby denied responsibility and was acquitted.

Defense lawyer Aminu Musa Yawuri urged judges considering the case at JET press time to acquit Lawal, arguing that under some interpretations of Shariah law, babies can remain in gestation in their mother's womb for up to five years, making it possible under Islam that her ex-husband could have fathered the child.

But a shariah prosecutor, Nurulhuda Muhammad Darma, argued that Lawal's pregnancy and divorce status were enough evidence of a crime.

"There is no other excuse that is acceptable," he told the court.

Introduction of Islamic law, or Shariah, has heightened Muslim-Christian tensions in Nigeria, Africa's most populous nation.

However, no one has yet been stoned since 12 mainly Muslim northern states seized military rule in 1999 and began to begin invoking Islamic law for the first time since independence 37 years earlier.

Judges stated they would announce their ruling Sept. 25.