By Bida Elly David
Abraham Chol, a renowned cleric and self-proclaimed prophet of the Kushite Ministry was yesterday sentenced to two years and nine months imprisonment by Juba high court for insulting the presidency.
Presiding over the final court verdict yesterday, Judge Samia Mohammed said that the renowned cleric and self-proclaimed prophet Abraham Chol was convicted for having violated sections 72 and 202 of the 2008 penal code act discouraging misconduct against the authority.
The court furthermore charged him with the amount of five Hundred thousand South Sudanese pounds (500,000 SSP) or three months imprisonment in case of failure.
The court further gave chance for the convict or his family to undertake appeal within fifteen (days) before the implementation of the verdict as stated.
In his part Wornyang Kiir, the defense lawyer of the 55 year convict was discontented with the final ruling against his client saying that the judgment was impartial and dictated legal proceedings.
“We are not contented with the final ruling as defensive lawyers to the convict. The judgement was not fair since it contained so many mistakes against the law the defense lawyer protested the verdict.
“The ruling under the section 202 was not fair and legal and we are not contented. The charge was 2 years and 9 months but Abraham so far spent 19 months. According to prison act, one year in prison is counted 9 months. If we accept the ruling that means we have more 8 months,” he lamented.
Meanwhile, the media failed to get a communique from the prosecution panel from the government’s side.
The cleric formerly demonstrated a divine revelation predicting that the president of the Republic of South Sudan and his first deputy would step down from presidential seat and let the Country to have a new leadership.
The statement reciprocated against him making the authority to undertake legal measures for his unjustifiable revelation after he was locked behind bar for over a year before being produced to the court, which now has handed him nearly three years imprisonment.