Mbeki must help Lawal
2003-08-31 15:54
Johannesburg - The ANC Women's League has called on President Thabo Mbeki as a leader of the African Union to intervene in the case of a Nigerian woman facing death because she had a child out of wedlock.
Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, the ANCWL's newly-elected president, described the matter as barbaric on Sunday saying her organisation would do everything possible to ensure the woman was not killed.
"... I need to reiterate a call by this conference that Amina Lawal does not deserve to die in the hands of the self-appointed police of morality in Nigeria," she told delegates attending the national ANCWL conference in Johannesburg.
"We are calling on the leadership of the African Union to move into Nigeria and to intervene by stopping this planned execution."
Mapisa-Nqakula said the ANCWL would hand a petition on the matter to the Nigerian Embassy as soon as possible.
Lawal was sentenced in March 2002 under Islamic law to be stoned to death for having a baby while not been married.
An Islamic court will rule on an appeal launched by Lawal, 31, on September 25.
The court has already ruled that regardless of the appeal results, her life will be spared until January 2004, when her daughter turns two.
- SAPA