Nigerian adulterer sentenced

2007-11-28 07:20

Lagos - A Nigerian sharia court has sentenced a man to one year in prison and 100 strokes of the cane for adultery, the official news agency has reported from the northern city of Katsina.

Mahmud Hamisu, 27, was the first man known to have been convicted of the crime in a sharia court since 2000 after 12 northern, mainly Muslim, Nigerian states began a stricter enforcement of Islamic law.

Hamisu was given 100 lashes in public just after his conviction, then moved to prison. Under Nigerian sharia law, adultery convictions required either a confession or at least three witnesses to the couple having sex.

About six unmarried women had been sentenced to death by stoning for adultery in the past seven years after their pregnancies were used as evidence against them.

All the sentences were overturned on appeal and no woman had been executed. Judge Khadi Mustapha said Hamisu was convicted after he confessed to the crime, said reports.

Hamisu was taken to court by a woman who had accused him of impregnating her. She was also convicted, but spared both the lashes and jail because of a mental disability.

Sharia courts were active in northern Nigeria for centuries before their power was reduced under British colonial rule.

The decision to re-introduce the sharia penal code in 2000 alienated Christian minorities in the 12 states and sparked sporadic rioting that killed thousands.

- Reuters