Nigerian Software Engineer arrested by State Security for sharing the Gospel with Emirate Chief’s daughter

Engr Simput Eagles Dafup

Unfortunately, it is no longer news to hear of Christian girls locked up in such places as Emirs’ palaces on the claim that the girls have decided to embrace Islam and no longer wish to see their biological parents. In previous editions of CA! we reported cases of such forced conversions in Nigeria from Bida, Jaaji, Sokoto, Kano etc. 

Now in just one case in the other direction, an adult daughter of a traditional Islamic chieftain decided to embrace Christianity. Unlike the dozens of cases involving Christian girls (and even boys), she was not abducted from school or home, nor locked up in some Christian cell somewhere.   In fact she privately discussed her new convictions with her father. Yet for expressing her doubts against Islam and deciding to embrace Christianity, the man who had shared the Gospel with her is now being treated like a criminal. 

On Monday, 8th January, 2018  five hilux vans were deployed by Nigeria’s Department of State Security to arrest Engineer Simput Eagles Dafup  who had traveled down from his base in Ghana to share the joy of Christmas with his folks at Jos. He was brutalized and tortured before being whisked off to some unknown location. 

Some other friends and kinsmen of Engr Dafup found with him on the premises were also assaulted and brutalized. However, while all these were taken to the Plateau State command of the DSS in Jos, Simput’s whereabout is not known. Addressing a Press Conference, Engr Dafup’s mother, Lydia Istifanus Dafup,  lamented that “nobody has contacted me or any member of my family as to the whereabout of my son.”

As reported in the media, the lady at the centre of the story is 18-year-old Nabila Umar Sanda Galadima, daughter of a traditional title holder in Biu, Borno State and a 200 Level student of Mass Communication at the Bingham University in Nasarawa State.  Nabila had developed strong interest in Christianity when Dafup shared the gospel with her when they met on a flight to Dubai some four years earlier.  Now over the Christmas break, learning Dafup was at home in Jos, she reconnected with him and expressed her intentions to fully convert to Christianity.

Speaking with the Daily Post, Executive Director, Voice of Northern Christian Movement, Pastor Kallamu Musa Ali Dikwa, lamented that “Muslims have abducted 100 Christian girls under the age of 18 and forcefully converted them to lslam and we have reported to security agencies severally but no arrest was made or return of Christian girls to their parents.”

Pastor Dikwa further noted the complicity of security forces who treat the Nigerian courts with utter contempt in some ongoing cases: “We have 3 Court cases of abduction of Christian girls and we have even gone to Court to appeal in Jos, Plateau State and the Judge has passed judgment directing Bauchi State Commissioner of Justice and Commissioner of Police to return the girls to their parents but Bauchi State government and Nigeria Police neglected the Court order.”

The National Christian Elders Forum has been emphasizing the point that Sharia legal system which is recognized in Nigeria’s supposedly secular constitution, is the de facto basis for adjudication in most of northern Nigeria!

In previous editions of CA! we had reported several instances of Christians being killed under the instructions of Islamic authorities just for sharing the gospel in the course of distribution of tracts, morning cry, or just plain rural mission.