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| Kanu |
It is the information of the Southeast Based Coalition of Human
Rights Organizations (SBCHROs), comprising: International Society for
Civil Liberties & the Rule of Law (Intersociety), Anambra State Branch
of the Civil Liberties Organization (CLO), Civil Liberties Organization,
Southeast Zone, Center for Human Rights & Peace Advocacy (CHRPA), Human
Rights Organization of Nigeria, Forum for Justice, Equity & Defense of
Human Rights (FJEDHR), Society Advocacy Watch Project (SPAW), Anambra Human
Rights Forum (AHRF), Southeast Good Governance Forum (SGGF), International
Solidarity for Peace & Human Rights Initiative (ITERSOLIDARITY) and
Igbo Ekunie Initiative (pan Igbo rights advocacy group) that
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu; the leader of the Indigenous People of Biafra (IPOB) and SBCHROs’
named Prisoner-of-Conscience (POC), has been detained by the
authorities of the Federal Government of Nigeria headed by Gen Muhammadu Buhari
for over 300 days or 10 months without trial. We also wish to inform that the
battered and lacerated leader of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria or Shiite
Muslim, Sheik Ibrahim Zaky El-Zaky has been detained dead or alive by President
Muhammadu Buhari for over 240 days or 8 months without trial and public
appearance.
According to the Black’s
Law Dictionary, 9th Edition (2009), a (criminal) trial is
a formal judicial examination of evidence and determination of legal claims in
an adversary proceeding. In other words, a criminal trial is a
proceeding preceding issuance of a judicial notice about intended legal claims
and accompanying evidence (charge) before a judge by the accusing authority
(i.e. AGF, Police or DSS) against an accused citizen in which the veracity of
legal claims and accompanying evidence is determined through formal judicial
examination. For a criminal trial to be called one, it must be rested on two
grand principles of rule of law: audi alteram partem (nobody should be tried or
condemned unheard) and nemo judex in sua causa(nobody should be a judge in
their own case or objectivity and neutrality of a trial judge). Where a
criminal charge or even trial lacks the above fundamentals, it
simply becomes trial-by-ordeal or jungle justice.
This is more so when
President Muhammadu Buhari himself has not only openly vowed to rot Citizen
Nnamdi Kanu in jail by fire by force, but has further gone ahead to interfere
with the judicial process. Under his presidential seal, the DSS ran amok on
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu and his constitutional liberties and flouted and disobeyed
all court orders made during Citizen Nnamdi Kanu’s detention in DSS custody.
President Buhari’s dictatorial interference in the court process involving
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu is democratically unheard of and tyrannical. This is
clearly evidenced by his public utterances during the 30th of
December 2015 Presidential Media Chat during which he presidentially and
dictatorially nullified a court bail granted to Citizen Nnamdi Kanu; thereby
threatening and undermining the judicial independence and the citizens’
constitutional rights to fair hearing and fair trial.
Going by the forgoing,
therefore, it is indisputably clear that Citizen Nnamdi Kanu is not undergoing
criminal trial in any court in Nigeria; likewise Sheik Ibrahim El-Zaky. Both
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu and Ibrahim El-Zaky have not only been grossly deprived of
these constitutional liberties, enshrined in the Constitution of the Federal
Republic of Nigeria 1999 as well as regional and international rights and
liberties; but they have also lost as much as 1,300 followers and supporters
since December 2015.
While 809 followers of
Sheik Ibrahim El-Zaky were massacred in December 2015 by the convoy of the
Chief of Army Staff, Lt Gen Turkur Buratai and under his authority and
supervision, as much as 250 followers and supporters of Citizen Nnamdi Kanu
were also massacred by the Nigerian Army and the Police at seven occasions on
30th August 2015 (Awka), 2nd December and 17th
December 2015 (Onitsha), January 18th and 29th and 9th of
February 2016 (Aba) and 30th of May 2016 (Nkpor, Onitsha and Asaba).
These attacks are not only a clear case of regime atrocity but also a heinous
crime of ethnocide, religocide and genocide.
Roles Played By Print
And Visual Media:
The Nigerian media of
present time is categorized into four sections of: visual/audio-visual, print,
social and online. By Section 22 of the 1999 Constitution of Nigeria: the
Press, radio, television and other agencies of the mass media SHALL at all
times be free to uphold the Fundamental Objectives (executive, legislative and
judicial governance and their constitutional responsibilities) and uphold the
responsibility and accountability of the Government to the people.
Section 39 of the same Constitution also guarantees freedom of expression; likewise
Section 38, which guarantees freedom of thought and conscience. That is
to say that the Nigerian Media ought to be the bastion of democracy and rule of
law including preservation and protection of citizens’ constitutional liberties
at all times. The Nigerian Media also ought to be the beacon of hope for the
masses of Nigeria irrespective of their ethnic, religious and class origins.
The safety and survival of Nigeria’s democracy ought to be in the hands of the
Nigerian Media as well.
Unfortunately, the Nigerian
Media of today is composed of the good, the bad and the ugly.
They are further composed of protagonists and antagonists of democracy
and rule of law. Unequivocally speaking, the online media, and to a
large extent, the social media have triumphantly emerged as protagonists of
democracy and rule of law in Nigeria as against the antagonistic and
pro-dictatorship roles of most of the country’s print and visual media.
During the military era in Nigeria, the print media was the leading advocate of
struggle to end military rule. This earned them a number of international merit
awards, robust technical assistance and recognitions; today, they have
slumbered and democratically deformed.
Investigative, development
and conscientious journalism has gone. Days are gone when print media
editorials shake the foundations of public office holders and their
institutions. Strategic percentage of the Nigeria’s print and visual media
stakes are now owned by the country’s leading doyens of corruption, leading to
the rot witnessed in the country’s leading print and visual media today. To the
extent that a print media reporter or correspondent is summarily dismissed by
his editorial board through a phone call on express orders of its chairman,
simply because he reported a land dispute in which the name of a popular priest
was mentioned, is a stark instance of the rot running riot on Nigerian print
and visual media. Again, to the extent that some correspondents of Southeast
extraction are routinely queried, abused and scorned by their editors and
editorial boards for filing reports concerning the nonviolent and peaceful
activities of IPOB is a further attestation to entrenched decadence in the
print and visual media.
It is vividly recalled that
in late 2015 and early 2016, we raised a public alarm concerning how case-files
in the custody of the DSS, containing supposedly hand-written statements of
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu and his co-accused, upon their arrest in July and October
2015, were duplicated, doctored and given to some hostile and enemy print media
and their online cronies of Southwest ownership. The publication of the
doctored and corrupted statements of Citizen Nnamdi Kanu and others was part of
the orchestrated trial by ordeal and media; designed by the Presidency to
convict and jail Citizen Nnamdi Kanu and his colleagues at all costs.
We are therefore not
surprised a bit over the continuation and intensification of the presidentially
oiled media war and trial against Citizen Nnamdi Kanu, his IPOB and the entire
Igbo race. It must be clearly stated that aside the online media and social
media, the print and visual media have always taken negative and docile
positions on issues concerning pro Biafra self determination campaign and its
nonviolent approach. The Nigerian Print and the Visual Media have always come
out in strong defense of the Buhari administration’s crude and homicidal
approaches towards the pro Biafran activists and activities and turned blind
eyes to sundry regime atrocities and other forms of crimes against humanity
perpetrated by the administration. The massacre of hundreds of unarmed and
innocent IPOB activists and secret mass burial of many of them has never for
one day featured prominently on any TV discourse or in leading print media in
Nigeria.
What makes headlines on TV
newslines or print media headlines are negative stories plotted or created by
Government of Gen Muhammadu Buhari and its coercive agencies against the IPOB
and the Igbo race. It must be stated that pro Biafra self determination
agitation using nonviolent and peaceful means; is never the sole making of
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu or his IPOB. Apart from the fact that the fundamental
elements of right to self determination such as right to peaceful assembly and
association are guaranteed by the 1999 Constitution, it was the Federal
Republic of Nigeria that willingly and originally adopted it regionally and
internationally as part of its municipal laws and regional and international
obligations. Till date, the Federal Republic of Nigeria is still a party to
them. It is therefore genocidal to massacre a group of citizens who opted
peacefully and non-violently to enjoy such rights willingly negotiated for them
by their embattled political territory.
We hereby call on the
leadership of IPOB World-Wide to be strong and remain peaceful and nonviolent.
We further ask them not to be dampened. Very importantly, they should be
mindful of those they hire and incorporate into their legal team. Moles and strawmen
abound. From right, left and centre of Nigeria, they are in torrents. If some
directors in the civil service in Nigeria can go to the extent of using names
of their colleagues that died years ago to be collecting and pocketing
emoluments on their behalf and still go by hallowed titles: Knights and
Ladies of the Church or Muslim Clerics; then it means nothing to other
conscienceless mortals including those in wigs and gowns to sell out and
compromise their clientele, fraternal and advocacy responsibilities over a bag-load
of blood money.
Commendation Of Nnamdi
Kanu’s Retained Legal Team: We commend the
conscientious conducts and collective courage of the retained legal team of
Citizen Nnamdi Kanu, comprising Barristers Ifeanyi Ejiofor (lead counsel), Chinwe
Umeche, Habila Turshak, Emmanuel Ayoola, J.B. Banjor and eight others. We
particularly commend Elder Chuks Muomah, SAN (Ochiagha n’ Oraifite and Pro
Bono Counsel-in-Chief). Their steadfastness and courage despite sundry
threats and blackmails from executive quarters are very commendable.
Renewal Of Nnamdi Kanu’s
Prisoner-Of-Conscience Award And Naming Of Ibrahim El-Zaky As A New
Prisoner-Of-Conscience: We hereby
renew the prestigious award of Prisoner-Of-Conscience (POC)
bestowed on Citizen Nnamdi Kanu on 30th of January 2016. We have
also adopted detained (dead or alive) Sheik Ibrahim El-Zaky of the Islamic
Movement of Nigeria as a Prisoner-Of-Conscience, whether dead or
alive. The persons of Citizens Nnamdi Kanu and Ibrahim El-Zaky
are so named on account of their long detention without trial and traces of no
group or individual violence in their names against the Government and
People of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
The award is both renewable
and revocable. It is renewable as long as fair trial and fair hearing is not
given to each of them and revocable if there is concrete evidence that both or
either of them is advocating or resorting to or has resorted to or advocated
violence of widespread or group nature; abandoning the UN principles of non-violence
and pacifism.
It is these notes that we
conclusively say: ALUTA CONTINUA! VICTORIA ACERTA!!
Signed:
For: Southeast Based
Coalition of Human Rights Organizations (SBCHROs)
(a) Emeka
Umeagbalasi, Leader, SBCHROs
Mobile Line: +2348174090052
Email: emekaumeagbalasi@yahoo.co.uk
(b) Comrade
Aloysius Attah, Head, Publicity Department, SBCHROs
Mobile Line: +2348035090548
(c) Jerry
Chukwuokoro, PhD, Head, Research & Strategy Department, SBCHROs
Mobile Line: +2348035372962
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