Alhaji Musa Mustafa is a biological father to Abdulkadir Musa (fruits vendor) who was shot dead by a trigger happy soldier in Gusau over bananas last week. He wants the authorities to take appropriate action against the soldier and also pay for compensation for the death of his son.
In an interview with Analyzer News, Alhaji Musa spoke on how the incident happened: Excepts:
May I know your name?
My name is Musa Mustafa
What is your relationship with the boy ( Abdulkadir Musa) who was shot dead by the soldier?
I am his biological father
What happened that led to his death?
The boy was selling water melon and bananas on that fateful day when his elder brother Shuaibu Musa called me on phone and told me that, Abdulkadir Musa was shot by a soldier and was rushed to the Yariman Bakura Specialist hospital.
I was completely disturbed on hearing this sad and shocking news, as such I rushed to the scene of the incident where my son was shot in order to find out what actually led to his murder.
When I learnt of what happened, I quickly rushed to my house where I met everybody crying. I tried to console them to stop crying because the boy would never return as he has passed on.
I later rode on my motorcycle and proceeded to the hospital where his body was taken. Immediately I arrived hospital, I removed his cloth and discovered that he was shot in the back and the bullet came out of his chest.
So on seeing this, I went to the police station where his case was reported and met with the Divisional Police Officer of the station and requested him to allow me take the corpse for burrial because I learnt that, the hospital’s mortuary was not in good shape.
I was allowed to go with the dead body and we burried him the following morning.
Can you shade more light on how the episode happened?
I was not at the venue but when I went there, they told me that, there was some misunderstanding between my son, his master and two soldiers who went their to buy some fruits.
When they bought some bundles of bananas, they also wanted to take the other one they didn’t pay for but they were prevented from taking the bananas away. That was the genesis of the crises.
The soldiers were reported to the police station very close to the place and they were arrested but were later released. One of the soldiers grew very annoyed and rushed to his hotel room and brought a gun.
Immediately he returned, he opened fire and shot my son in the back. There was another boy who was also shot during the incident but was not killed. He however maintained serious injury.
Now that your son was killed, what is your appeal.
I am appealing to the both Zamfara state and the federal government to do something immediately in this case.
I don’t want my son’s murderer to go unpunished. Because if people are killed without any reason and no action is taken, there will never be peace in the country.
I want the soldier to be punished according to the laws of the land and I what the Nigerian Army to pay for the compensation for the killing of my son who is one of the breadwinners of the family.
He was killed without any reason. So I am appealing to the appropriate authorities to make sure that justice has taken its course.
I have already reported the issue to all the relevant agencies including the Human Right Commission and the press.
