US Congressman Riley M. Moore has called on the Nigerian government to pardon a farmer, Sunday Jackson, who was sentenced to death for killing a Fulani herdsman who invaded his farm while trying to defend himself.
The Republican politician made the call while speaking in the U.S House of Representatives hearing on President Donald Trump’s redesignation of Nigeria as a Country of Particular Concern (CPC).
According to him, the verdict convicting Jackson for defending himself is unfair.
“I would urge the Nigerian government to take a look at pardoning Sunday Jackson, who is an individual who was fighting for his own life, defending his life against one of these Fulani militants,” Moore, a Republican, said during the hearing on Thursday.
“That Fulani militant lost his life in that struggle, and now that person, Sunday Jackson, is facing the d3ath penalty. Where is the justice in that?”
In 2014, farmer Sunday Jackson was attacked on his farm in Codonti Forest by Buba Bawuro, a Fulani herdsman who had trespassed with his cattle in Adamawa State.
According to Jackson, Bawuro pulled a kn!fe and stabbed him multiple times during the altercation. In a struggle, Jackson managed to seize the knife and fatally stabbed Bawuro in the neck.
Jackson was subsequently arrested and charged with murder, despite his consistent assertion that he acted in self-defence.
In 2021, a Yola court sentenced him to death by hanging, a decision the Supreme Court affirmed.
On Friday, March 7, 2025, the Supreme Court of Nigeria upheld the death sentence of Sunday Jackson.