A Nigerian atheist, Mubarak Bala, has been freed after serving more than four years in prison for blasphemy.
He is now living in a safe house as his legal team fear his life may be in danger, the BBC said in an exclusive report.
Mubarak Bala, 40, was convicted in a court in Kano after he pleaded guilty to 18 charges relating to a controversial Facebook post shared in 2020.
“The concern about my safety is always there,” he told the BBC in an exclusive interview as he tucked into his first meal as a free man.
Blasphemy is an offence under Islamic law – Sharia – which operates alongside secular law in 12 states in the north. It is also an offence under Nigeria’s criminal law.
Bala said there were times during his incarceration that he felt he “may not get out alive”. He feared he could have been targeted by guards or fellow inmates in the first prison he was in, in Kano.
“Freedom is here, but also there is an underlying threat I now have to face,” he said. “All those years, those threats, maybe they’re out there.”
He could have been inside for much longer if it was not for an appeals court judge who reduced the initial 24-year sentence last year, describing it as “excessive”.
“Everything is new to me. Everything is new,” he said.
Bala was arrested after a group of lawyers filed a complaint with the police about the social media post.
He then spent two years in prison awaiting trial before being convicted in 2022
Bala said he had no regrets. “My activism, my posting on social media, I always knew the worst would happen, When I made the decision to come out, I knew I could be killed. I knew the dangers, and I still decided to do it.”
