Nigerian police arrest atheist for allegedly insulting prophet Muhammad

The Kaduna State Police Command has arrested an atheist, Mubarak Bala, for a Facebook post in which he allegedly insulted Prophet Muhammad.

Bala’s arrest at his residence in Kaduna followed a petition by a group of lawyers to the Commissioner of Police in Kano State to prosecute him for his “inciting comments”.

The petition signed by one S.S. Umar reads, “We are submitting this complaint against one Mubarak Bala of Layin Masallacin Bilai, Karkasara Quarters, Kano. The said Mubarak was born and raised as a Muslim but for his own personal reason decided to leave Islam for atheism sometime in 2014 and has since then been writing stuff on his Facebook page that are provocative and annoying to the Muslims.”

Similarly, a Change.org petition titled ‘Mubarak Bala’s Facebook account should be closed,’ which was started three days ago, has been signed by 16,942 as of Wednesday morning.

Bala is expected to be prosecuted for blasphemy, a crime which contravenes the Sharia Penal Code.

The atheist had posted on Monday, “Fact is, you have no life after this one. You have been dead before, long before you were born, billions of years on death.”

A search through Bala’s Facebook page also shows him mocking Christian clerics, including the founder of The Synagogue Church of All Nations, TB Joshua.

When contacted, the police Public Relations Officer in Kaduna State, Mohammed Jalige said, “I cannot tell you anything about the offence, why he was arrested. We only received a signal that he should be arrested. It is not our case. The case is (for) Kano State Command.”

Asked if Bala would be transferred to the Kano command, Jalige said, “I don’t know actually. We are waiting for further directives from Kano State Command. He was arrested yesterday. He is in police custody currently.”

The Kano PPRO, Haruna Abdullahi, however told our correspondent that he had no comments on the matter.

In 2014, then 29-year-old Bala was said to have been forcefully committed by his family to a psychiatric hospital in Kano when he renounced Islam.

Though Bala’s family believed he was insane, he was later discharged from the psychiatric hospital after he was declared sane.