RIGHTS GROUP REJECTS MILITARY ACTION IN NIGER DELTA

HUMAN RIGHTS WRITERS ASSOCIATION OF NIGERIA, HURIWA, a democracy inclined registered coalition of human rights activists yesterday criticized the decision of President Umaru Musa Yar’adua to seek military assistance from Great Britain to fight what it considers as insurgency and militancy in the oil rich but heavily neglected Niger Delta areas. The Rights group said military option is unacceptable, unworkable and will naturally lead to the escalation of civil strife in the crisis ravaged region.

Specifically, at a bilateral parley during the just concluded G-8 group of industrialized Nations conference held in Japan, the British Prime Minister Mr. Gordon Brown accepted a plea by the Nigerian President for Britain to offer military assistance to help check the rise in violence and crude oil thefts in the Niger Delta region. As a consequence of the outcome of the parley between the British and Nigerian leaders in Japan, the Movement for the Emancipation of the Niger Delta, the premier militia group in the oil producing areas has reportedly called off a unilateral truce it entered with the Nigerian military manning oil facilities in the region.

The Rights group in a statement made available to newsmen and endorsed by its’ National Coordinator, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko advised the federal Government not to give conflicting signals as to the best strategies for resolving the violent conflicts afflicting the oil producing areas even as it asked the Government to remove the root cause of the civil unrests in the areas which is the criminal gross under development of the oil producing areas by successive administrations in Nigeria and in the various Niger Delta States.

The group stated that the acceptance of any military assistance no mater how well intentioned and innocuous would be viewed as a declaration of war by the people of the oil producing areas who have endured series of human rights violations and systematic underdevelopment of their communities over the last fifty years since crude oil was discovered in commercial quantity. “Military assistance from Britain or indeed any other foreign government will surely exacerbate the situation in the Niger Delta Region”.

According to HURIWA; “The proposed military assistance from the increasingly unpopular Prime Minister of Britain Gordon Brown to Nigeria at this point in time when he [Brown] can not even tackle the increasing Knife crime in the United Kingdom is unacceptable and unwelcome by Nigerians. Why invite foreign military assistance even when the same Government has shown clear signals that it will rather explore non-military option to resolve the crisis in the Niger Delta region?, the group asked .

HURIWA stated that it associates itself with the popular view in Britain that the offer of military assistance to Nigeria by Gordon Brown will amount to a big misadventure even as it called for rapid and comprehensive infrastructural development of the oil producing areas as the best panacea to the crisis. The Rights group called on armed militants in the oil rich Niger Delta to disarm and dialogue constructively with the Federal Government and for the Government to begin the construction of infrastructures that will improve the living condition of the populace because according to HURIWA, peaceful, meaningful and constructive dialogues are the best solution to the problems afflicting the Niger Delta.

Nigeria: Rights Group Slams FG Over Unizik Grant

Vanguard (Lagos)
8 September 2008
Posted to the web 8 September 2008
Chioma Obinna

The Human Rights Writers Association of Nigeria (HURIWA) yesterday carpeted the Federal Government for withholding since 1992 the N500million naira take-off grants meant for the Nnamdi Azikiwe University Awka.
The group also called on the present administration to order immediate probe of the circumstances and personalities responsible for what they described as 'heinous crime'.

Specifically, the Acting Vice Chancellor of the Nnamdi Azikiwe Federal University, Awka, in Anambra State, South East Nigeria Professor Boniface Egboka had at the weekend reportedly raised alarm that the previous federal administrations since 1992 refused to release the original statutory take off grants meant for the University that is located at the heart of Igbo land. Report by authoritative sources stated that the funds were approved by the Federal Government for the institution's initial running and infrastructural costs when it was taken over by the Federal administration in 1992 and was reportedly fraudulently diverted to another institution in the northern part of the Country.
In a statement signed by the National Coordinator of HURIWA, Comrade Emmanuel Onwubiko, the Rights Group condemned the delay in redressing this anomaly by the current administration even when it prides itself as having the respect for the rule of law and due processes.
The Rights group urged President Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar'Adua to direct his Federal Minister of Education Aja Nwachukwu to attend to this grave situation with all the urgency it deserves so as to ameliorate the infrastructural crises bedeviling the University.
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Onwubiko stated that the withholding of the take-off grant of that Federal University located in the South Eastern region, already perceived rightly as being grossly marginalized and underdeveloped by the Federal administration over the years, could be viewed as the continuation of the regime of gross marginalization of the Igbo speaking people.

TORTURE: THE CONSPIRACY OF SILENCE

BY EMMANUEL ONWUBIKO
Even as President Umaru Musa Yar’adua, with all due respect, literarily chase shadows outside the shores of Nigeria in the name of seeking foreign military assistance to tackle the ongoing upheavals in the oil rich but heavily neglected Niger Delta Region of Nigeria, one Achilles’ heel that the current government is yet to confront frontally with the aim of checking its’ increasing trend with its attendant devastating consequences on the psycho-sociological wellbeing of Nigerians, is the use of TORTURE by virtually all security operatives in Nigeria to extract confessional statements from crime suspects.

Torture, unfortunately, has come to be accepted by the security operatives as the best crime fighting mechanism in the country so much so that even the media workers in the country see nothing wrong in the use of this deadly and inhumane measure to tackle the dangerous upsurge in crime in the country. Not too long ago, I had an encounter with an Editor of a leading National Daily over the prominence the Newspaper gave to a story of one Ali Kwara, a private person who set up a detention center where he keeps some alleged crime suspects arrested by him during his regular hunting expeditions in parts of Gombe and other Northern States. This man has been variously accused by Human Rights groups of violating the Human Rights of these suspects who are kept in his custody while he carries out his routine unorthodox interrogations of these people with the aim of making further arrest. I protested the front page coverage granted this private militia leader in a respected National Daily which to me amounts to an endorsement of the activities of this man that has come under intense criticism of Rights Activists. But this Editor who writes a Sunday back page column in the newspaper whose publisher has lately become music and fashion promoter, told me pointblank to mind my business and that he saw nothing wrong in the methodology of Ali Kwara in his one man crime fighting squad with the tacit support of the Nigeria police. The Editor cited example of his personal unpleasant encounter with the men of the underworld and castigated human Rights Activists for crusading for a humane crime fighting mechanism. He told me that dangerous problem demands dangerous solution. Unfortunately, the Minister of Abuja Aliyu Modibo Umar who went to school in the United States has appointed this Ali Kwara who allegedly uses torture on crime suspects, as one of his security Aides. What a shame?

This is the sorry state that Nigeria has reached. If the Journalist who ought to be the VANGUARD AND CONSCIENCE of the nation prefers the use of torture to tackle crime what should we then expect from our President and Commander in Chief who is not even bothered about the upsurge in the use of torture by security operatives? Or what do we expect from the Abuja minister who does not have any workable agenda for the development of Abuja?

To cap it up, on the 17th and 18th of July 2008 when the African Union under the auspices of the African Commission on Human and Peoples Rights staged a training workshop in Abuja for Heads of Police and Prisons from across West African sub-region on the Resolutions on Guidelines and measures for the prohibition and prevention of torture, cruel, inhuman or Degrading treatment or Punishment in Africa otherwise called the Robben Island Guidelines R.I.G, the Heads of Nigeria’s Police and Prison did not attend but delegated a low ranking Police officer- a Commissioner of Police even an Assistant Comptroller of Prisons attended on behalf of the Nigerian Prison’s Comptroller General. The Minister of Interior Godwin Abbe, a retired Military General was similarly represented by a low profile private staff and the Attorney General and Minister of Justice Mike Andooaker, was represented by the Director of Prosecution. Of all the key personalities who ought to provide leadership on the issue of ending the practice of torture in Nigeria, only the Chairman of the police service Commission Parry Osayande a retired Assistant Inspector General of Police thought it wise to personally attend such a high profile event which was attended by lots of foreign guests including officials from the United Nations and the Economic Community of West African States represented by the president of the ECOWAS commission IBN CHAMBERS. The high profile absence of these high profile Nigerian Government officials paid with tax payers’ money is a public statement on the acceptance of the use of torture in official circle- I stand to be contradicted. Why was the Inspector General of Police and eight or so of the Deputy Inspectors’ General absent from the workshop? Why was the Comptroller General of Prisons who has spoken so much about Rights-based prison administration in Nigeria absent at such an auspicious occasion where he could have told the world the effort he is making to stop the use of torture in the prison facilities in Nigeria? It shows that Government officials pay only lip service to the issue of tackling torture in the Country.

The commissioner representing Nigeria at the African Commission of Human and Peoples Rights Mrs. Dupe Atoki who also chairs the Robben Island Guidelines working Group of the African Commission lamented the Human Rights implications of the use of torture and inhuman treatment of crime suspects in Africa and called on all authorities concerned to do something urgent to tackle the problem. She reminded her audience which included this writer that the Charter on Human and Peoples Rights establishes a regional Human Rights body known as the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights with the mandate to promote the observance of the Charter, ensure the protection of the Rights and Freedoms set out in the Charter, interpret the Charter and advise on its implementation.

Specifically, Article 5 of the African Charter provides that every individual SHALL have the right to the respect of the dignity inherent in a human being and to the recognition of his legal status. All forms of exploitation and degradation of humanity and particularly slavery, slave trade, torture, cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment and punishment SHALL be prohibited.

It will interest Nigerians to know that the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights has been domesticated in Nigeria and is therefore a binding law on all persons and authorities. Section 34 of the 1999 constitution of Nigeria which provides safeguards against the use of torture in Nigeria makes the freedom from TORTURE as an ABSOLUTE RIGHT. But a walk around the police stations and other detention centers in Nigeria will show you a clear picture of the use of torture as routine and acceptable. In my work as a Human Rights Activist, I have had cause to pay surprise visits to police stations across Nigeria and I can regrettably report that the pattern of torture is slightly the same or possibly increases in intensity depending on the location of the detention center. Like in Garki Police station in Abuja, torture is used regularly to extract information from crime suspects. In Kafanchan police station, the intensity of torture is phenomenal because of the remote location of the police detention center from the Kaduna City center where most Rights Activists reside. Torture is the final stage to extra-judicial execution of crime suspects which are also practiced across Nigeria. It is time Nigeria stop paying lip service to the all important issue of ending the widespread use of torture by security operatives now. Politicians should desist from using some language that shows that they tolerate torture. The President must provide leadership and show Nigerians that he can end the use of torture since he is even a victim of torture by association haven lost a dear brother General Shehu Musa Yar’adua who was tortured to death in Prison by the General Sani Abacha-led military junta.
+EMMANUEL ONWUBIKO IS A HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVIST AND JOURNALIST IN ABUJA.