Alleged murder: Stop treating Chidinma like superstar, lawyers, activists charge police

Juliana Francis and Eniola Bambe

A 21-year-old 300-level female student of University of Lagos (UNILAG), Miss. Chidinma Adaora Ojukwu, on June 24, 2021, left Nigerians reeling in shock as she revealed in chilling details, how she stabbed Super TV Chief Executive Officer (CEO), Michael Ataga, to death in self-defence.

Chidinma, who looked like butter wouldn’t melt in her mouth, was tracked by the police and arrested after Ataga’s lifeless body was on June 16 found in a flat in Lekki Phase 1, Lagos with multiple wounds.

Since her admission of killing Ataga because he wanted to rape her, she has become journalists most sought after public persona. The interviews and confessions of Chidinma kept changing following different interviews with different journalists.

Human rights lawyers and activists have repeatedly urged the police to charge the suspect to court, but the police maintained that it was still investigating the matter.

The situation came to a head when Chidinma, last week, recanted her confession of killing Ataga.

In a viral video, Chidinma said after she and Ataga had checked into the hotel, she stepped out, returned later to find Ataga in a pool of blood.

She recounted: “I went to withdraw money from the ATM and when I was leaving, he locked the door after me. When I came back, I noticed that the door wasn’t locked and the duvet was on the floor. The couch was facing the door and the bed was stained with blood already. The floor where he was was filled with blood and then music and TV were on. The room was already disarranged like someone broke in, then I saw him on the floor.”

She said that she picked the deceased’s ATM card and bolted. She didn’t alert the police because she was afraid of being blamed for the murder.

Chidinma latest media revelation had attracted gasped of outrage from different quarters, with Nigerians accusing the police of playing hanky-panky game with the case.

Aside from the fact that Nigerians were angry that police were making Chidinma into a celebrity, which may send wrong signals to younger generation, they were stunned to realise while watching the video interview, that the suspect had enough time to fluff her hair, make-up her face and dressed nicely.

Members of the House of Representative condemned the continual parading of Chidinma. Lawyers and human rights activists have also joined their voices in demanding that police should stop parading Chidinma before the media and instead, charge her to court.

The Executive Director of the Rule of Law and Accountability Advocacy Action Centre (RULAAC), Mr. Okechukwu Nwanguma, said parading of Chidinma before the media was clearly another instance of media trial, which he described as “an illegal and unprofessional practice” that has remained an integral aspect of police investigation in Nigeria.

He added: “I wish to reiterate- because I have said this several times- that parading suspects before the media is prejudicial to fair trial. It is unconstitutional and denies the accused person his or her constitutional right to be presumed innocent until the person has been brought before a properly constituted Court of law and accorded all the due process guarantees and proved either guilty or otherwise. Police usually parade accused persons to advertise their effectiveness in fighting crime. But it exposes the paraded persons to public opprobrium, especially when the person eventually turns out- after due trial by the court- to be innocent of the alleged crime.”

Nwanguma further argued that both the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) and the Administration of Criminal Justice Law of Lagos State (ACJL) require that interrogations must be carried out, video recorded in the presence of the legal representative of the accused person. “This is for the purpose of checking the use of torture by the police - usually in private- to extract confessions. It is usually for the purpose of use as evidence during court trial- when the need arises. Such interrogations are not meant to be conducted before the media,” Nwanguma noted.

He added: “Chidinma is being subjected to media trial, and this is unprofessional, illegal and unconstitutional. The second case where a TV crew was granted access to interview Chidinma is taking the illegality of media trial to a higher level. The accused is still in police custody several weeks after she was arrested and paraded. I don't know what is delaying her arraignment in court. I don't know what purpose the police want to achieve by granting access to the TV crew to interview Chidinma a second time. And she looked well dressed and prepared for that interview. It was like a rehearsed drama. Granting that access on its own raises some suspicion. But the fact that Chidinma contradicted her initial confessions heightens the suspicion. I smell a rat.”

Nwanguma stated that he was happy that the House of Representatives intervened and urged that Chidinma must not die in police custody. He further said: “I strongly believe that there is more to this case than meets the ordinary eye. There are likely powerful persons involved and attempts may probably be on course to manipulate investigation. I urge the Inspector-General of Police (IGP) to direct the Force Criminal Intelligence and Investigations Department (FCIID), Alagbon, to take over the investigation.”

A human rights lawyer, Justus Ijeoma, who is also the Executive Director of the International Human Rights and Equity Defense Foundation (I-REF), said that Chidinma was still a suspect and her rights, especially in the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria, states that her rights must not be taken away because she is a suspect of a capital offence.

He added: “Giving her opportunity to make her hair, doesn’t concern the issue at hand. It is her right! Just because she’s in custody doesn’t mean her rights or dignity should be taken away. In Nigeria, it has become a norm for suspects to have lost their dignity and appear tough in front of the cameras and people. When an abnormality lingers in a system for so long, it has the tendencies to become a norm. When you tend to shift from the long standing tradition, both negatively and positively, people tend to worry, especially when she has been given a preferential treatment perhaps as a lady by the security operatives.”

Ijeoma added that Chidinma should have her day in court, stressing that her lawyer should be able to put up a defence for her. He added: “These days, social media tends to put forth a lot of perceptions, but Chidinma still has her right to presumption of innocence. Celebrating the victory of her arrest shouldn't be the goal. Perhaps she committed the crime or not, she should be processed in accordance with the law of this country.”

Inibehe Effiong, a human rights lawyer, said that the police were just dramatising the case and making nothing out of it. He opined that it was unusual to see a suspect charged with a high profile murder case, granting interviews like a celebrity.

He also said: “I think the police are hiding something, and that doesn't mean that her looking neat and making her hair is a crime because she is entitled to dignity under the Anti-torture Act of 2017, and 2019, under Section 34 of the Constitution. The point is that the attention given to her is unusual and it is showing that the police are not being thorough with their investigation. This looks like another high profile case that has been bungled by the police and this is embarrassing to the country and to the police as an institution.”

Effiong said that the continual parading of Chidinma before the media underscored how insensitive the police were to the family of Ataga. “It also undermines the criminal law and it may implicate her because she has been saying different things. This shows the police are not investigating the matter thoroughly. Chidinma shouldn't be treated as a celebrity, even if she has her rights under the constitution.”