38 men gang-rape Malaysian teenage girl
Malaysian police have detained 13 men and are
still looking for other suspects following
allegations that a 15-year-old girl was raped by
38 men in an abandoned hut, a report said on
Friday.
The media reported that the assault took place in
the Northern state of Kelantan on May 20 when
the girl met a girlfriend and was lured to an
empty hut reported to be a local drug haunt.
It said that the men took turns to rape her for
hours.
Police said they were also investigating whether
her 17-year-old friend was also raped.
Report says the alleged attack, which is one of
several brutal cases this week underscoring the
violence to which women are being subjected
across Asia, sparked outrage among women.
Politicians from a Muslim party running in the
region said that their proposal to introduce
Islamic hudud law with harsh penalties would
deter offenders.
State and federal police officers either declined
comment or could not be immediately reached.
Media accounts, quoting information from district
police chief, Azham Otham, said that 38 men were
involved in the crime.
The reports said that several of those detained
had tested positive for amphetamine.
It added that a man and his two teenage sons
were among those detained.
However, police said action could have been
taken had villagers reported the addicts’
presence.
“It is very disturbing to me that no one in the
village was even suspicious when the closest
neighbour was a mere 20 metres away,” police
chief, Azham said.
According to police statistics, almost 3,000 rape
cases were reported to the police in 2012, of
which 52 per cent involved girls of 16 and below.
Convicted rapists face up to 30 years in prison
and whipping, but many on Internet sites wanted
stricter punishment.
Friday, May 30, 2014
Why do families kill their daughters
The stoning to death of a pregnant Pakistani
woman by her own family has thrust the issue of
so-called honour killings into the spotlight.
What is an 'honour killing'?
It is the killing of a member of a family who is
perceived to have brought dishonour upon
relatives.
Pressure group Human Rights Watch says the
most common reasons are that the victim:
refused to enter into an arranged marriage
was the victim of a sexual assault or rape
had sexual relations outside marriage, even if
only alleged
But killings can be carried out for more trivial
reasons, like dressing in a way deemed
inappropriate or displaying behaviour seen as
disobedient.
"The perpetrator seeks to excuse it as some sort
of protection of their family's honour, reputation or
values," says Mustafa Qadri, Pakistan researcher
for Amnesty International.
Last year, three women were killed in Pakistan
after being captured on video "smiling and
laughing in the rain outside their family home".
Men may also be targeted, by members of the
family of a woman with whom they are perceived
to have had an inappropriate relationship.
Last year in India, a young couple were murdered
in Haryan state because they planned to marry
despite being from the same caste. Nidhi Barak,
20, was beaten to death and Dharmender Barak,
23, dismembered alive.
But Rothna Begum, researcher on the Middle East
and North Africa for Human Rights Watch, says
women bear the brunt of such punishments
because they are more widely perceived as
"keepers" of family or community honour.
How do families justify the murders?
The idea that a murder can be honourable is
believed to come from tribal customs where an
allegation against a woman can be enough to
defile a family's reputation - the idea that "a life
without honour is not worth living".
Perpetrators have sometimes tried to justify their
actions on religious grounds - but none of the
world's main religions condone honour-related
crimes.
In some countries, these tribal customs have been
codified into law, which may constitute legal
grounds for killing a family member.
In Pakistan's Federally Administered Tribal Areas
for example, "rivaj" - or tribal custom - is codified
without being defined. This could be interpreted to
provide a legal basis for a killing, says Mr Qadri.
Nidhi and Dharmender were murdered allegedly by
Nidhi's family for planning to marry
The killings are also more prevalent in
disenfranchised or remote communities.
A collective failure by the authorities to prosecute
such crimes, and the tacit endorsement by local
clerics, contribute to them being more accepted,
says Mr Qadri.
But above all else, they are a feature of deeply
patriarchal societies where there is a belief that a
woman's actions reflect on the men around her,
he adds.
How widespread are such murders?
The United Nations Population Fund estimates that
5,000 women globally are murdered in this way
each year. Last year, 869 women were said to
have been killed in Pakistan.
Killings have previously sparked protests in places
like Pakistan
Women's advocacy groups suspect the global
figure is likely to be closer to 20,000 victims per
year - but Mr Qadri thinks the figure is probably
hundreds of thousands.
Although prevalent in the Middle East and Asia, it
is a widespread global phenomenon, he says.
The UN describes it as a "growing problem", and
says estimates are difficult because killings are
rarely reported to police, and families often "cover
up" the crime, disguising it as an accident or
suicide.
Shafilea Ahmed was killed in front of her other
siblings by her parents when she was 17
In the UK, figures suggest about 12 such killings
take place each year.
One recent high profile case was that of 17-year-
old Shafilea Ahmed, whose parents were convicted
of suffocating her with a plastic bag. Prosecutors
said her parents believed she had brought
dishonour on the family by wearing Western-style
clothing and mixing with white friends.
How does a family decide to kill?
"In the name of preserving so-called family
honour, women and girls are shot, stoned, burned,
buried alive, strangled, smothered and knifed to
death," said a statement from the UN on
International Women's Day.
Sometimes killings happen spontaneously, but in
other cases they may be formal and organised. A
meeting may be held by male family members and
senior women who decide if a woman should be
killed, and work out the method.
In the latest widely-reported case, Farzana
Parveen, who was three months pregnant, was
pelted with bricks and bludgeoned by relatives
furious because she married against their wishes.
Women mourn over the body of Farzana Parveen
Are people ever convicted?
Most such killings are particularly difficult to prove
or prosecute. There are often no witnesses and
little motivation within the community for police to
pursue suspects.
In Pakistan, conviction rates are very low because
of blood-money laws which allow kin to forgive
perpetrators, usually family members in such
cases.
Even if convicted, men who have taken part may
sometimes receive reduced sentences.
Rukhsana Bibi and her husband Mohammad Yunus
were attacked last May
Rukhsana Bibi claims she survived an attempted
an attack that left her husband dead in Kohistan, a
remote and mountainous region in the northern
part of Pakistan.
She is one of very few women who have spoken
out to seek justice. No-one has been convicted of
the attack.
"Honour killings" should be prosecuted as murder
without exception, says Ms Begum.
Victims' families should receive protection and
sentences should not be reduced where there are
convictions citing violation of honour, she adds.
'I murdered my first wife to marry my second –
The husband of a pregnant Pakistani woman who was stoned and
beaten to death outside a courthouse in Lahore has said he murdered
his first wife – a claim that has delivered another twist to a story that
has shocked the country.
Farzana Parveen was murdered on Tuesday by more than two dozen
attackers, including her brother and father, for marrying against her
family’s will. Now Ms Parveen’s husband, Mohammad Iqbal, 45, has
admitted he strangled his first wife so that he could marry again.
“I was in love with Farzana and killed my first wife because of this
love,” he told the AFP news agency in a phone call. Mr Iqbal said he
was spared a prison term because his son, who alerted police to the
murder, later forgave him under Pakistan’s controversial blood-money
laws. Having made the confession, Mr Iqbal reportedly switched off
his phone.
Pakistan’s Prime Minister, Nawaz Sharif, demanded to know why
police apparently stood by while Ms Parveen was killed. Mr Iqbal told
Reuters that police did nothing during the 15 minutes the violence
lasted. “I begged them to help us but they said, this is not our duty.”
Police deny this and said the girl was dead when they got the scene
Stone age
Man Convicted For Marrying '5th'
Wife.
A man has been sentenced to four years in jail in
Niger in the first ever conviction for slavery in the
country.
The pressure group Anti-Slavery International told
the BBC the 63-year-old man was convicted of
having what is known as a "fifth wife".
Men in Niger are allowed to have four wives under
a local interpretation of Islamic law.
With a "fifth wife", no marriage takes place and the
woman is treated solely as property.
Niger officially banned slavery in 2003 but anti-
slavery organisations say thousands of people still
live in subjugation.
The conviction took place in the town of Birnin
Konni in south-west Niger, close to the border
with Nigeria.
Anti-Slavery International says "fifth wives" are
often girls of slave descent sold to wealthy men
who view the purchase of young women as a sign
of prestige.
The women face a lifetime of physical and
psychological abuse and forced labour, the group
says.
The case was taken to court by Anti-Slavery's
partners in Niger, Timidria.
Sarah Mathewson, Africa Programme Co-ordinator
at Anti-Slavery International, said it was
"incredible" to achieve a conviction.
"It's been over 10 years since the law against
slavery was passed in Niger and we've worked
since then to bring perpetrators of slavery to
justice," she said.
"We hope that this judgment will serve as a
catalyst for more prosecutions, as we are
pursuing many other cases before the courts."
In a landmark case in 2008, the West African
regional body Ecowas found Niger's government
guilty of failing to protect a woman from slavery.
It ordered the government to pay compensation to
the victim.
Wife.
A man has been sentenced to four years in jail in
Niger in the first ever conviction for slavery in the
country.
The pressure group Anti-Slavery International told
the BBC the 63-year-old man was convicted of
having what is known as a "fifth wife".
Men in Niger are allowed to have four wives under
a local interpretation of Islamic law.
With a "fifth wife", no marriage takes place and the
woman is treated solely as property.
Niger officially banned slavery in 2003 but anti-
slavery organisations say thousands of people still
live in subjugation.
The conviction took place in the town of Birnin
Konni in south-west Niger, close to the border
with Nigeria.
Anti-Slavery International says "fifth wives" are
often girls of slave descent sold to wealthy men
who view the purchase of young women as a sign
of prestige.
The women face a lifetime of physical and
psychological abuse and forced labour, the group
says.
The case was taken to court by Anti-Slavery's
partners in Niger, Timidria.
Sarah Mathewson, Africa Programme Co-ordinator
at Anti-Slavery International, said it was
"incredible" to achieve a conviction.
"It's been over 10 years since the law against
slavery was passed in Niger and we've worked
since then to bring perpetrators of slavery to
justice," she said.
"We hope that this judgment will serve as a
catalyst for more prosecutions, as we are
pursuing many other cases before the courts."
In a landmark case in 2008, the West African
regional body Ecowas found Niger's government
guilty of failing to protect a woman from slavery.
It ordered the government to pay compensation to
the victim.
Thursday, May 29, 2014
Pathetic
Two India girls 'gang-raped' and
hanged in Uttar Pradesh
Ever since the fatal gang rape of a student in Delhi
in December 2012, there have been public protests
and an outcry against sexual violence
Two Indian girls found hanging from a tree in a
village in the northern Indian state of Uttar
Pradesh had been gang raped, police say.
One man has been held over the murders and two
officers removed from duty for not registering
cases when the girls were reported missing, say
police.
The girls were found in Badaun district and are
thought to be in their early to mid teens and from
the Dalit community.
Violence and discrimination against women remain
deeply entrenched.
Scrutiny of sexual violence in India has grown
since the 2012 gang rape and murder of a student
on a Delhi bus.
The government tightened laws on sexual violence
last year after widespread protests following that
attack.
Senior police official Atul Saxena told the BBC the
two girls were found hanging from a tree in Katra
Shahadatganj village in Badaun district on
Wednesday morning.
He said the police were looking for two more men
in connection with the alleged rape and hanging.
The post mortem and cremation of the girls was
completed on Wednesday and further test results
are expected.
"We are still investigating how the girls went
missing and were allegedly raped and hung from a
tree," Mr Saxena said.
Earlier this year a 20-year-old tribal woman was
gang raped in eastern West Bengal state allegedly
on orders of village elders who objected to her
relationship with a m
hanged in Uttar Pradesh
Ever since the fatal gang rape of a student in Delhi
in December 2012, there have been public protests
and an outcry against sexual violence
Two Indian girls found hanging from a tree in a
village in the northern Indian state of Uttar
Pradesh had been gang raped, police say.
One man has been held over the murders and two
officers removed from duty for not registering
cases when the girls were reported missing, say
police.
The girls were found in Badaun district and are
thought to be in their early to mid teens and from
the Dalit community.
Violence and discrimination against women remain
deeply entrenched.
Scrutiny of sexual violence in India has grown
since the 2012 gang rape and murder of a student
on a Delhi bus.
The government tightened laws on sexual violence
last year after widespread protests following that
attack.
Senior police official Atul Saxena told the BBC the
two girls were found hanging from a tree in Katra
Shahadatganj village in Badaun district on
Wednesday morning.
He said the police were looking for two more men
in connection with the alleged rape and hanging.
The post mortem and cremation of the girls was
completed on Wednesday and further test results
are expected.
"We are still investigating how the girls went
missing and were allegedly raped and hung from a
tree," Mr Saxena said.
Earlier this year a 20-year-old tribal woman was
gang raped in eastern West Bengal state allegedly
on orders of village elders who objected to her
relationship with a m
Wednesday, May 28, 2014
Switched At Birth
South African mother refuses
to hand back switched baby
Two children mistakenly swapped at
birth four years ago at centre of painful
dispute between families over future
custody
The two babies were confused in Boksburg,
east of Johannesburg, in 2010 Photograph: Jo
Foord/Getty Images/Dorling Kindersley
Two mothers in South Africa have
discovered they are raising each other's
daughters after they were mistakenly
switched at birth in a hospital four years
ago.
But while one of the women wants to
correct the error and reclaim her
biological child, the other is refusing to
give back the girl she has raised as her
own, posing a huge legal dilemma.
Henk Strydom, a lawyer for one of the
mothers, who cannot be identified
because of a court order, described the
inadvertent swap as a travesty and
tragedy that is unlikely to have a happy
ending.
Both mothers gave birth at the Tambo
Memorial Hospital in Boksburg, east of
Johannesburg, on the same day in 2010
and were discharged. "Nobody suspected
anything," Strydom said.
But last year one of the mothers, who is
33 and unemployed, sued her ex‑partner
for maintenance for her daughter.
Strydom continued: "The man denied he
was the father. A DNA test was done it
was found it was not his baby and not
her baby. She was devastated. She didn't
know what to do."
Eventually she met the other mother and
since last December they have been
attending joint counselling sessions,
arranged by the hospital. This has
included meeting their biological
daughters.
Strydom said of his client: "She said there
are resemblances to herself. She
conveyed to me that it was traumatic.
You can see it's not easy for her. She has
to care for a child that is not hers on her
own while her child is with someone
else."
The woman reportedly became unhappy
with the process and approached the
children's court in a bid to gain custody
of her biological child, but the other
mother refused. Strydom agreed to
represent the woman, who has one elder
child, pro bono.
"It's a tragedy. She wants the baby back
but it seems the other mother is
reluctant. It's four years later: you can
understand she doesn't want to give up
her baby."
Earlier this week the high court in
Pretoria appointed the University of
Pretoria's Centre for Child Law to
investigate what will now be in the best
interests of the children, which is the
guiding principle under South African
law. It must report back within 90 days.
Strydom added: "Your guess is as good as
mine what the court may decide. It's a
travesty. How do you rectify it after four
years? The longer you wait, the more
traumatic it will be. But whatever
happens, someone won't be happy."
He said at this point, he and his client do
not want to sue the hospital or
government health department, which is
currently helping with the case and
providing counselling.
The Centre for Child Law will now
interview the mothers and fathers as well
as any other person with a "significant
relationship" with either of the girls. The
children and mothers will undergo "full
and thorough" clinical assessments and
may be seen by a psychologist.
Karabo Ngidi, an attorney with the
centre, said: "What's going to happen
must be in the best interests of the
children. Biology is an important aspect
but not the only one."
The families are of Zulu ethnicity and so
Zulu tradition, culture and customary law
will be a factor, she added. It is also still
possible the ex-partner of the mother
taking legal action could be the biological
father of the girl who was switched.
It is not the first child-swap case to come
to light in South Africa. In 1995, two
mothers were awarded damages after
their sons, born in 1989, were
accidentally switched at the
Johannesburg hospital where they were
born.
In 2009 in Oregon in the United States,
Dee Ann Angell and Kay Rene Reed
discovered that they had been mistakenly
mixed up at birth in 1953 when a nurse
brought them back from bathing. Last
year in Japan a 60-year-old man swapped
at birth from his rich parents to a poor
family was given compensation. He grew
up on welfare and became a truck driver,
whereas his biological siblings - and the
boy brought up in his place - attended
private secondary schools and
universities.
Bruce Laing, a clinical psychologist in
Johannesburg, said the long-term effects
of a baby swap could be "profound",
"terrifying" and "incredibly
traumatising". He told the Times of South
Africa: "An increasingly complicated
situation is that some resentment
towards a child that is not yours might
occur. The parents might always be
thinking 'What if?'"
to hand back switched baby
Two children mistakenly swapped at
birth four years ago at centre of painful
dispute between families over future
custody
The two babies were confused in Boksburg,
east of Johannesburg, in 2010 Photograph: Jo
Foord/Getty Images/Dorling Kindersley
Two mothers in South Africa have
discovered they are raising each other's
daughters after they were mistakenly
switched at birth in a hospital four years
ago.
But while one of the women wants to
correct the error and reclaim her
biological child, the other is refusing to
give back the girl she has raised as her
own, posing a huge legal dilemma.
Henk Strydom, a lawyer for one of the
mothers, who cannot be identified
because of a court order, described the
inadvertent swap as a travesty and
tragedy that is unlikely to have a happy
ending.
Both mothers gave birth at the Tambo
Memorial Hospital in Boksburg, east of
Johannesburg, on the same day in 2010
and were discharged. "Nobody suspected
anything," Strydom said.
But last year one of the mothers, who is
33 and unemployed, sued her ex‑partner
for maintenance for her daughter.
Strydom continued: "The man denied he
was the father. A DNA test was done it
was found it was not his baby and not
her baby. She was devastated. She didn't
know what to do."
Eventually she met the other mother and
since last December they have been
attending joint counselling sessions,
arranged by the hospital. This has
included meeting their biological
daughters.
Strydom said of his client: "She said there
are resemblances to herself. She
conveyed to me that it was traumatic.
You can see it's not easy for her. She has
to care for a child that is not hers on her
own while her child is with someone
else."
The woman reportedly became unhappy
with the process and approached the
children's court in a bid to gain custody
of her biological child, but the other
mother refused. Strydom agreed to
represent the woman, who has one elder
child, pro bono.
"It's a tragedy. She wants the baby back
but it seems the other mother is
reluctant. It's four years later: you can
understand she doesn't want to give up
her baby."
Earlier this week the high court in
Pretoria appointed the University of
Pretoria's Centre for Child Law to
investigate what will now be in the best
interests of the children, which is the
guiding principle under South African
law. It must report back within 90 days.
Strydom added: "Your guess is as good as
mine what the court may decide. It's a
travesty. How do you rectify it after four
years? The longer you wait, the more
traumatic it will be. But whatever
happens, someone won't be happy."
He said at this point, he and his client do
not want to sue the hospital or
government health department, which is
currently helping with the case and
providing counselling.
The Centre for Child Law will now
interview the mothers and fathers as well
as any other person with a "significant
relationship" with either of the girls. The
children and mothers will undergo "full
and thorough" clinical assessments and
may be seen by a psychologist.
Karabo Ngidi, an attorney with the
centre, said: "What's going to happen
must be in the best interests of the
children. Biology is an important aspect
but not the only one."
The families are of Zulu ethnicity and so
Zulu tradition, culture and customary law
will be a factor, she added. It is also still
possible the ex-partner of the mother
taking legal action could be the biological
father of the girl who was switched.
It is not the first child-swap case to come
to light in South Africa. In 1995, two
mothers were awarded damages after
their sons, born in 1989, were
accidentally switched at the
Johannesburg hospital where they were
born.
In 2009 in Oregon in the United States,
Dee Ann Angell and Kay Rene Reed
discovered that they had been mistakenly
mixed up at birth in 1953 when a nurse
brought them back from bathing. Last
year in Japan a 60-year-old man swapped
at birth from his rich parents to a poor
family was given compensation. He grew
up on welfare and became a truck driver,
whereas his biological siblings - and the
boy brought up in his place - attended
private secondary schools and
universities.
Bruce Laing, a clinical psychologist in
Johannesburg, said the long-term effects
of a baby swap could be "profound",
"terrifying" and "incredibly
traumatising". He told the Times of South
Africa: "An increasingly complicated
situation is that some resentment
towards a child that is not yours might
occur. The parents might always be
thinking 'What if?'"
No compulsion in .......
Sudanese woman sentenced
to death for apostasy gives
birth in prison
Husband and lawyer are denied access to
Meriam Ibrahim after she gives birth to
girl a month before due date
Meriam Ibrahim with her husband, Daniel
Wani.
A Sudanese woman sentenced to death
for apostasy has given birth to a baby
girl in the Khartoum prison where she is
being held with her 20-month-old son.
Meriam Ibrahim, 27, gave birth in the
early hours of Tuesday, a month before
her due date. Amnesty International said
the condition of the mother and baby
was not known as Ibrahim's lawyer and
her husband, a US citizen, had been
denied access to her.
Omdurman women's prison has a basic
clinic, where the child is thought to have
been born. Ibrahim has been shackled
since being imprisoned.
"The Sudanese government must
guarantee her safety and the safety of her
children, including the newborn baby,"
said Amnesty's Manar Idriss. Amnesty
has called for Ibrahim's unconditional
release.
This month a court ruled that Ibrahim's
marriage to a Christian man was invalid
and that she was guilty of apostasy and
adultery. Ibrahim was sentenced to 100
lashes for adultery and to be hanged for
apostasy.
Ibrahim denied the charges, telling the
court she was the daughter of a Sudanese
Muslim man and an Ethiopian Christian
woman, and had been brought up as a
Christian after her father left when she
was six. She refused to renounce her
faith.
Her lawyers lodged an appeal against the
convictions last week. "There is no
timeframe for the appeal. They usually
take a few months, but given the
international attention this might be
much quicker," Idriss said.
If the appeal fails, Ibrahim's lawyers may
seek rulings from Sudan's supreme court
and constitutional court.
Sudan has faced mounting international
criticism over the case, with the UK
government calling the convictions and
sentences barbaric. The US state
department said it was deeply disturbed
by the case. Globally, more than 700,000
people had backed Amnesty's call for
Ibrahim's release by noon on Tuesday,
including 113,500 in the UK.
Idriss said conditions inside the prison
were reasonable, but Amnesty was
concerned about the use of restraints. It
described shackling as cruel and
inhuman. Ibrahim has told her lawyers
that the shackles are painful and make
movement difficult.
Daniel Wani, Ibrahim's husband, who
lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, is
in Khartoum trying to secure his wife
and children's release. The couple
decided it was better for their young son,
Martin, to remain with his mother.
The Sudanese authorities have said they
will defer Ibrahim's death sentence for
two years to allow her to nurse her
newborn baby.
to death for apostasy gives
birth in prison
Husband and lawyer are denied access to
Meriam Ibrahim after she gives birth to
girl a month before due date
Meriam Ibrahim with her husband, Daniel
Wani.
A Sudanese woman sentenced to death
for apostasy has given birth to a baby
girl in the Khartoum prison where she is
being held with her 20-month-old son.
Meriam Ibrahim, 27, gave birth in the
early hours of Tuesday, a month before
her due date. Amnesty International said
the condition of the mother and baby
was not known as Ibrahim's lawyer and
her husband, a US citizen, had been
denied access to her.
Omdurman women's prison has a basic
clinic, where the child is thought to have
been born. Ibrahim has been shackled
since being imprisoned.
"The Sudanese government must
guarantee her safety and the safety of her
children, including the newborn baby,"
said Amnesty's Manar Idriss. Amnesty
has called for Ibrahim's unconditional
release.
This month a court ruled that Ibrahim's
marriage to a Christian man was invalid
and that she was guilty of apostasy and
adultery. Ibrahim was sentenced to 100
lashes for adultery and to be hanged for
apostasy.
Ibrahim denied the charges, telling the
court she was the daughter of a Sudanese
Muslim man and an Ethiopian Christian
woman, and had been brought up as a
Christian after her father left when she
was six. She refused to renounce her
faith.
Her lawyers lodged an appeal against the
convictions last week. "There is no
timeframe for the appeal. They usually
take a few months, but given the
international attention this might be
much quicker," Idriss said.
If the appeal fails, Ibrahim's lawyers may
seek rulings from Sudan's supreme court
and constitutional court.
Sudan has faced mounting international
criticism over the case, with the UK
government calling the convictions and
sentences barbaric. The US state
department said it was deeply disturbed
by the case. Globally, more than 700,000
people had backed Amnesty's call for
Ibrahim's release by noon on Tuesday,
including 113,500 in the UK.
Idriss said conditions inside the prison
were reasonable, but Amnesty was
concerned about the use of restraints. It
described shackling as cruel and
inhuman. Ibrahim has told her lawyers
that the shackles are painful and make
movement difficult.
Daniel Wani, Ibrahim's husband, who
lives in Manchester, New Hampshire, is
in Khartoum trying to secure his wife
and children's release. The couple
decided it was better for their young son,
Martin, to remain with his mother.
The Sudanese authorities have said they
will defer Ibrahim's death sentence for
two years to allow her to nurse her
newborn baby.
Great man
How do I solve this problem with my
husband and daughter?
May 28, 2014
Dear Agatha ,
I ’ m in my early 50 s
and have been married for close to 18 years
without a child . About 10 years ago, I
noticed certain changes in my husband’ s
behavior. From his staunch support of me,
he became lukewarm and started making
statements I couldn’ t understand .
Since I have been unable to give him a
child , I naturally thought his bitterness had
to do with that, hence I didn’ t say anything
to further aggravate the situation in my
home.
About two weeks ago, he called me for a
heart to heart discussion in one of the
restaurants he and I usesoccasionally when
we didn ’ t feel like eating at home. I thought
it was to confirm my worst fear of him
having a child outside our home.
When I got there , he was in the company of
a younger lady who from her appearance is
very successful. The lady also brought with
her three children , all very cute .
My heart sunk at the sight of this lady and
her children. It meant only one thing ; this
was his other wife and children. I almost
didn’ t want to confront him and his family
but he sighted me and beckoned me to
come.
Against my will , I sat down and completely
ignored the other lady and her children. I
didn’ t even bother to be nice to the baby
who at sighting me wanted me to carry her
and play with her.
My husband and the woman noticed my
hostility but kept quiet.
After introducing me to the woman as his
wife , he asked, if I can recognise the young
lady before me. I asked him ; if I should. He
didn’ t respond but shook his head in what
appears to be annoyance .
The lady too became so hostile and
gathered her children to her bosom . After
an uncomfortable spell of silence in which
we ordered and eat our meals, he again
instructed I take a good look at the lady
before answering the question of whether I
know the lady or not .
At that point , I became furious and told
both of them to go to hell . I stormed out on
both of them. He didn’ t bother to stop me
and didn ’ t make any reference to that scene
when he got home even though I was ready
to fight him.
The following day was a Saturday . As early
as 7 in the morning, members of my family ,
his ’ and the lady and her children all
assembled in my house . Not even the
presence of my family stopped me from
ordering the lady out of my house but my
aunty, who after the death of my mother,
now represents my mother, overruled me.
To cut the long story short ; the woman
turned out to be the daughter I had when I
was in secondary school . I was in form 3
when I became pregnant with her. The
head - boy who was responsible for the
pregnancy didn ’ t deny the baby ; his mother
took over the child from me and despite
attempts by both families to make me yield
to seeing the child , I never did.
Instead I ran away from home; they didn’ t
know my whereabouts until a decade later
when I came back home. Fortunately for
me, I made something out of my life and by
the time I came back , my mother out of
depression at my behavior had died .
Since I didn’ t bother to bring up the issue
of the child , no member of my family did. In
my heart she was dead which is why I
never discussed her with my husband or
the fact that I had a child before .
Now she was in my sitting room with my
grandchildren-what an irony .
My aunty was the one who called my
husband a decade ago to tell him of the
child . Unknown to me, he traced her and
made contacts with her and was even there
on her wedding day .
Since her father had died , he stepped into
her life as her father .
Her children actually call him grandpa .
Everybody in his family and mine are in the
know.
I haven’ t been myself since that meeting.
My daughter has refused to talk to me . My
husband too is keeping his distance.
Agatha , please help me. I don’ t know how
to begin the process of thanking my
husband for his love or making up with my
daughter and grandchildren.
husband and daughter?
May 28, 2014
Dear Agatha ,
I ’ m in my early 50 s
and have been married for close to 18 years
without a child . About 10 years ago, I
noticed certain changes in my husband’ s
behavior. From his staunch support of me,
he became lukewarm and started making
statements I couldn’ t understand .
Since I have been unable to give him a
child , I naturally thought his bitterness had
to do with that, hence I didn’ t say anything
to further aggravate the situation in my
home.
About two weeks ago, he called me for a
heart to heart discussion in one of the
restaurants he and I usesoccasionally when
we didn ’ t feel like eating at home. I thought
it was to confirm my worst fear of him
having a child outside our home.
When I got there , he was in the company of
a younger lady who from her appearance is
very successful. The lady also brought with
her three children , all very cute .
My heart sunk at the sight of this lady and
her children. It meant only one thing ; this
was his other wife and children. I almost
didn’ t want to confront him and his family
but he sighted me and beckoned me to
come.
Against my will , I sat down and completely
ignored the other lady and her children. I
didn’ t even bother to be nice to the baby
who at sighting me wanted me to carry her
and play with her.
My husband and the woman noticed my
hostility but kept quiet.
After introducing me to the woman as his
wife , he asked, if I can recognise the young
lady before me. I asked him ; if I should. He
didn’ t respond but shook his head in what
appears to be annoyance .
The lady too became so hostile and
gathered her children to her bosom . After
an uncomfortable spell of silence in which
we ordered and eat our meals, he again
instructed I take a good look at the lady
before answering the question of whether I
know the lady or not .
At that point , I became furious and told
both of them to go to hell . I stormed out on
both of them. He didn’ t bother to stop me
and didn ’ t make any reference to that scene
when he got home even though I was ready
to fight him.
The following day was a Saturday . As early
as 7 in the morning, members of my family ,
his ’ and the lady and her children all
assembled in my house . Not even the
presence of my family stopped me from
ordering the lady out of my house but my
aunty, who after the death of my mother,
now represents my mother, overruled me.
To cut the long story short ; the woman
turned out to be the daughter I had when I
was in secondary school . I was in form 3
when I became pregnant with her. The
head - boy who was responsible for the
pregnancy didn ’ t deny the baby ; his mother
took over the child from me and despite
attempts by both families to make me yield
to seeing the child , I never did.
Instead I ran away from home; they didn’ t
know my whereabouts until a decade later
when I came back home. Fortunately for
me, I made something out of my life and by
the time I came back , my mother out of
depression at my behavior had died .
Since I didn’ t bother to bring up the issue
of the child , no member of my family did. In
my heart she was dead which is why I
never discussed her with my husband or
the fact that I had a child before .
Now she was in my sitting room with my
grandchildren-what an irony .
My aunty was the one who called my
husband a decade ago to tell him of the
child . Unknown to me, he traced her and
made contacts with her and was even there
on her wedding day .
Since her father had died , he stepped into
her life as her father .
Her children actually call him grandpa .
Everybody in his family and mine are in the
know.
I haven’ t been myself since that meeting.
My daughter has refused to talk to me . My
husband too is keeping his distance.
Agatha , please help me. I don’ t know how
to begin the process of thanking my
husband for his love or making up with my
daughter and grandchildren.
Tuesday, May 27, 2014
Honour killing....
Lahore honour killing: Woman stoned to
death by her family 'for marrying a man
she loved'
Farzana Iqbal was killed by nearly 20
men in front of the High Court
Supporters of Tehrik-e-Minhaj ul Quran,
an Islamic Organisation protest against
'honour killings' of women in Lahore
By HEATHER SAUL
Tuesday 27 May 2014
A 25-year-old woman has been stoned to
death by her family in front of a Pakistan
high court for marrying a man she was in
love with, police in Lahore have said.
Police official Naseem Butt said 20
members of Farzana Iqbal’s family
attacked her and her husband with sticks
and bricks in broad daylight on Tuesday
before a crowd of onlookers.
Mr Butt said Ms Iqbal had married
Mohammad Iqbal while she was engaged
to her cousin. She had been waiting for
the High Court in the eastern city of
Lahore to open when the attack took
place.
Her lawyer, Mustafa Kharal, said her
father had filed an abduction case against
her husband, which the couple was
contesting.
Umer Cheema, a senior police officer, said
her father, two brothers and former fiancé
were involved in the so-called honour
killing, which left Ms Iqbal with severe
head injuries. She was later pronounced
dead in hospital.
All the suspects except her father
escaped. He admitted killing his daughter,
Mr Cheema said.
Around 1,000 Pakistani women are killed
every year by their families in honour
killings, according to Pakistani rights
group the Aurat Foundation, but the true
figure is probably even higher. The Aurat
Foundation only produces figures based
on newspaper reports and the
government does not compile national
statistics.
Cases that do result in a conviction can
still see the killer walk free, as Pakistani
law allows a victim's family to forgive
their killer. The killer is often a member
of the victim's family, allowing them to
nominate a person to commit the act who
would then be forgiven.
"This is a huge flaw in the law," Wasim
Wagha, a member of the Foundation told
Reuters . "We are really struggling on this
issue."
death by her family 'for marrying a man
she loved'
Farzana Iqbal was killed by nearly 20
men in front of the High Court
Supporters of Tehrik-e-Minhaj ul Quran,
an Islamic Organisation protest against
'honour killings' of women in Lahore
By HEATHER SAUL
Tuesday 27 May 2014
A 25-year-old woman has been stoned to
death by her family in front of a Pakistan
high court for marrying a man she was in
love with, police in Lahore have said.
Police official Naseem Butt said 20
members of Farzana Iqbal’s family
attacked her and her husband with sticks
and bricks in broad daylight on Tuesday
before a crowd of onlookers.
Mr Butt said Ms Iqbal had married
Mohammad Iqbal while she was engaged
to her cousin. She had been waiting for
the High Court in the eastern city of
Lahore to open when the attack took
place.
Her lawyer, Mustafa Kharal, said her
father had filed an abduction case against
her husband, which the couple was
contesting.
Umer Cheema, a senior police officer, said
her father, two brothers and former fiancé
were involved in the so-called honour
killing, which left Ms Iqbal with severe
head injuries. She was later pronounced
dead in hospital.
All the suspects except her father
escaped. He admitted killing his daughter,
Mr Cheema said.
Around 1,000 Pakistani women are killed
every year by their families in honour
killings, according to Pakistani rights
group the Aurat Foundation, but the true
figure is probably even higher. The Aurat
Foundation only produces figures based
on newspaper reports and the
government does not compile national
statistics.
Cases that do result in a conviction can
still see the killer walk free, as Pakistani
law allows a victim's family to forgive
their killer. The killer is often a member
of the victim's family, allowing them to
nominate a person to commit the act who
would then be forgiven.
"This is a huge flaw in the law," Wasim
Wagha, a member of the Foundation told
Reuters . "We are really struggling on this
issue."
Thursday, May 22, 2014
Good
American teacher fired after 'asking young
students for relationship advice.......An American school teacher has been fired after
she allegedly asked her nine year old students for
dating advice. Cassandre Fiering, a New York substitute teacher,
discussed details of her romantic life in class and
asked her students to act out scenarios in which
they pretended to be her boyfriend, DNAinfo reported, citing official documents. According to a report from the Department of
Education Special Commissioner of Investigation,
Ms Fiering, 45, asked the children to help her
choose between two male suitors and complained
that the younger man, a mechanic, "didn't return"
her calls. "The kids were saying, 'Oh, we're your
counsellor'," she told DNA Info. "They were
excited to have me listen to their advice. … They
were saying all kinds of things, trying to help me
because this guy was being a jerk to me." The report also alleged that she called them
"munchkins", hugged one of her students, tapped
another on his shoulder and touched the thighs of
two other children. She also suggested they should dress like
"demons" and "toilet paper" her boyfriend's
house, according to investigators. Ms Fiering, who is appealing her dismissal and
also works as an actress, insists she did not
inappropriately touch the children and the
conversation was harmless, adding: "I certainly
wasn't talking about sex or anything".
Agony of an escapee
Agonies Of Escapee
Schoolgirl: How I Wish
My Colleagues Joined
Me In Fleeing’ Kareem Haruna — May 22, 2014 One of the Chibok schoolgirls, Sarah
Lawan, who escaped from captivity on
the second day Boko Haram abducted
them said she still wished her colleagues
in detention had summoned her kind of
courage to flee from their abductors. Sarah who is 19 years old said she gets
more traumatized each time she bumps
into the grieving parents of her school
mates that are still in the captivity of the
Boko Haram. “Each time I see the parents of my
friends and classmates moving around in
town with long faces, I feel sad, I feel
like weeping again and I wished they
agreed to run with us when we got the
chance to run”, Sarah, who spoke with LEADERSHIP on phone, said. The lucky
Chibok girl said most of the abducted
girls were terrified by the threat warning
made to them by the Boko Haram
gunmen while they were being taken
away. “They told us that they are taking us
somewhere safer, but warned that if any
one of us dare tried to runaway they
would shoot at us and kill us. So
everyone was scared of disobeying their
orders; even when I saw the opportunity to run”, said Sarah. “We were driven on many trucks for
hours to a point where we were told to go
down the trucks; it was at that point,
after I observed that the men that
abducted us were not paying attention to
us that I whispered to some of us to run, but many were scared because of the
earlier warning; I was terrified as well but
I and one other girl, summoned courage
and snuck out and we began to run. We
ran for hours until we got to where we
saw people we could trust who later assisted us to get to Chibok”. Sarah wants the federal government and
the Nigeria security forces to quickly
rescue the girls, as she said she is not
comfortable with the fact that the girls
are still in the custody of the abductions. “Everyday I wake up with the hope that
my friends would be rescued; everyday
we keep looking towards the direction of
the road leading into Chibok to see if the
girls would be brought in; but everyday
our hopes are dampened when the night comes and none of them come home.
The federal government and our soldiers
must do everything to rescue them
because I am always scared each time I
remember the girls are with those men;
they don’t look kind or gentle, they are not nice people to be with; I fear they
don’t harm them”, said Sarah in broken
voice. The girl said she is not aware if American
soldiers have arrived Sambisa or if any
of them have commenced searching for
her friends. “I don’t know if there are soldiers from
America, but I see some few soldiers in
CHIBOK, who are just doing nothing
serious that I can say will help bring my
friends back. I heard that hunters are in
Maiduguri and they want to go and search for my school mates; I plead with
government to allow them go since they
are hunters, I believe they have the
ability to rescue the girls; we have seen
and heard how they arrest Boko Haram
members and hand them over to the soldiers”, said Sarah
Forces of darkness
Girl forced to watch father, brother
killed by Boko Haram tells her story on may 21, 2014 at 11:16 pm in interview Deborah Peter You might also like Deborah Peter was 12 years old when gunmen from
the Nigerian terrorist group burst into her home in
northern Nigeria and shot dead her father, a Christian
pastor, and her 14-year- old brother Caleb, and then
forced her to lie with their corpses. She was attacked in 2011, well before Boko Haram’s
abduction of more than 250 schoolgirls and young
women in April finally drew international attention and
condemnation. Peter is from Chibok, the same small town where the
girls were kidnapped by the Islamic terrorist group,
whose name is interpreted as “Western education is
forbidden.” “I decided to tell the world my story when the Chibok
girls were taken because everyone needs to know
how horrible Boko Haram is,” Peter said in a
statement. “They kill innocent people who never hurt
them.”#DeborahNPeter Peter, now 15 and attending a Christian school in rural
Virginia, came to the US Capitol to recount her ordeal
for leaders of the House Foreign Affairs Committee. Peter sat in the front row as House committee
members, led by Chairman Ed Royce, a California
Republican, pressed officials from the State and
Defence Departments to do more to aid the Nigerian
government in the effort to rescue the abducted girls
and young women and step up efforts to help the Nigerian military fight Boko Haram. So far, Nigeria’s human rights record and history of
official corruption have hindered U.S. efforts to assist
the country’s military in fighting the terrorists. As a young woman whose story helps rivet world
attention, Peter’s appearance was reminiscent of
those by Malala Yousafzai, who was shot in the face
by the Pakistani Taliban for her efforts to encourage
girls to seek an education. Peter spoke softly, without evident emotion, in
recounting the day she lost her father and brother and
then fled her home and subsequently her country. Her father had been threatened before by members of
Boko Haram, beaten up and told to abandon his
ministry, she said. On December 22, 2011, gunmen
came to her home around 7pm, once more demanding
that he renounce his faith. “My dad refused to deny his faith,” she said. After he was shot, the gunmen debated what to do
about her brother, with one of them saying he should
be spared because of his youth, she said. Another
man said he should be killed so he won’t grow up to
become a pastor, she said. Peter said she thinks her father, who had been
breathing, died when he saw Caleb shot twice in the
head. ”I was in shock, so I didn’t know what was happening”
as the gunmen forced her to lie down alongside her
father’s and brother’s corpses, she said. That’s where
Nigerian soldiers found her the next day, she said. Asked at the news conference what she now thinks of
Boko Haram, Peter replied haltingly that “I think they
are bad” before her voice trailed off. Peter said she would have remained in peril in
Chibok, where Boko Haram would condemn her
because her mother had converted from Islam to
Christianity. Another pastor — himself later killed by
Boko Haram — paid to get her out of the region, and
a group called the Jubilee Campaign helped her come to the U.S., according to information she provided to
the House committee. She now attends the Mountain
Mission School, a Christian school in Grundy, a small
town in southwestern Virginia near the state’s border
with Kentucky. Her story has been advanced by Christian religious-
freedom advocates, who focus on Boko Haram as
anti-Christian in its terrorist activities. Earlier this
month, she spoke at the Hudson Institute in
Washington. In testimony to the committee, Sarah Sewall, the US
under secretary of state for civilian security,
democracy and human rights, said it would be wrong
to cast the Boko Haram threat primarily in sectarian
terms. “Certainly, Boko Haram has targeted Christians, and
Nigerian officials believe that 85 percent of the girls
kidnapped at Chibok are Christians, and have been
forced to convert to Islam after their kidnapping,” Ms
Sewall said. “We want to highlight, however, that
Boko Haram is a problem that affects Nigerians of every religion. Indeed, the majority of Boko Haram’s
estimated 4000 total victims to date have been
Muslim.”
Wednesday, May 21, 2014
Court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
Court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
Court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
court restrains FRSC from invalidating driving licence
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
A Federal High Court in Abuja on Tuesday declared that it was unconstitutional for
the Federal Road Safety Corps to invalidate driving licences and other vehicle
documents which had yet to expire.
Justice Adeniyi Ademola therefore in a judgment declared as null and void the
purported regulation/directive of the FRSC to the effect that all extant driving licences
as well as other vehicle documents would be invalid as from October 1, 2013.
The judge held that such directive amounted to “executive recklessness”.
The judgment followed an earlier one delivered by Justice John Tsoho of the Lagos
Division of the Federal High Court, on March 26, 2014, declaring that the FRSC had
no power to impose its newly introduced number plates on users because there was
no existing law backing it.
In his judgment on Tuesday, Justice Ademola declared that the directive regarding
the intention of the FRSC to invalidate some yet-to-expire driving licences and other
documents, was ultra vires and was contrary to sections 5 and 10(3)(u) of the FRSC
Act 2007.
He also made an order “compelling the respondents (the FRSC and its Corps
Marshal), by themselves or by their officers, agents, servants, privies or otherwise”
to be restrained from giving effect to “the regulation/declarations purportedly made
by the Federal Road Safety Commission on September 30, 2013, until the expiration
of the applicant’s and or all extant driving licenses/documents to be expired on
March 24, 2013 and June 2014 respectively.”
The judgment was in a suit by an Abuja-based lawyer, Mr. Jimoh Musa, who said he
got his driving license on February 17, 2011 and by the provision of the FRSC Act, it
would expire on March 24, 2014.
The suit was dated September 11, 2013 and filed on September 25, 2013.
He said he also renewed his documents in 2013 and they were to expire by June
2014.
He stated that his suit was informed by an announcement by the FRSC’s Corps
Marshal that as from September 30, 2013 all existing valid driving licences and
vehicle plate number as well as vehicle documents not yet expired would be
declared null and void.
Musa also stated that the FRSC threatened to arrest and prosecute all lawful holders
of valid driving licence and vehicle number plates as well as vehicle documents not
yet expired.
He added that the directive and threat by the FRSC would prevent him from using his
car for lawful day to day activities.
Justice Ademola, while granting all the prayers by the plaintiff, held that there was
currently no law empowering the FRSC to do what it threatened to do.
Tuesday, May 20, 2014
Most expensive divorce in human history
From around the web More from The Independent The Independent 2 Derry Street London W8 5TT © independent.co.uk Terms & Policies Privacy Policy Code of Conduct EUROPE Dmitry Rybolovlev: World's most expensive
divorce costs Russian billionaire £2.7bn Dmitry Rybolovlev (here pictured with an
unidentified companion) has been ordered to pay
about £2.7bn to his ex-wife ..Russian billionaire Dmitry Rybolovlev has been
ordered to pay about £2.7bn to his ex-wife in what
could become the biggest divorce settlement in
history. In papers delivered on Monday to both parties, a
court in Switzerland said Mr Rybolovlev, 47, one
of the owners of French soccer club AS Monaco,
must pay more than 4bn Swiss francs to Elena
Rybolovleva, also 47. The judgment also granted his ex-wife property in
the ski resort of Gstaad worth 130.5m francs
(£86m) and two other buildings in the wealthy
Cologny area of Geneva, where the couple once
lived together. It confirmed her custody of their
13-year-old daughter, Anna. The couple also has an adult daughter, Ekaterina. Ms Rybolovleva’s lawyer Marc Bonnant called it
“the most expensive divorce in history”, an
unheard-of amount for Switzerland. But Mr Rybolovlev's lawyer, Tetiana Bersheda,
said that the judgment's cash order was likely to
be whittled down during the appeal process.
“There will definitely be a new appellate review
and therefore this judgment is not final given the
existence of two levels of appeal in Switzerland,” she said. Elena Rybolovleva A statement by Mr Bonnant and two other lawyers
in the case said the record judgment was “a
complete victory” for their client and that under
Swiss law she was entitled to half the fortune he
made during their marriage. Most of that fortune
was transferred to Cyprus-based trusts in 2005. The three lawyers said Monday's ruling
demonstrated that “no one — not even a Russian
tycoon who put his fabulous fortune into legal
structures such as trusts and offshore companies
— is above the law”. But Mr Rybolovlev's lawyer suggested the
opposite, praising the judgment for “confirming
both the validity of the trusts created by Mr
Rybolovlev and the validity of the asset transfer to
them that occurred long before his wife initiated
divorce proceedings”. His ex-wife had demanded about £3.5bn from the
man known as the “fertilizer king”, whose fortune
from potash mining once made him the world's
79th richest person. He is now ranked 147th on
the Forbes list of billionaires, with an estimated
fortune of £5.2bn. The couple met as university students in Perm,
Russia, and married there in 1987. Divorce
proceedings began in 2008. Mr Rybolovlev and his daughter Ekaterina used
money from the trusts to buy some of the most
expensive properties in the US, including a
penthouse apartment at Central Park West in New
York and a mansion in Palm Beach, Florida.
13-year-old kills father ..... Keeps decomposing body
Colorado boy, 13, accused of killing dad, concealing death for days
DENVER (Reuters) - A 13-year-old Colorado boy suspected of shooting his father dead and concealing the killing for days by calling the man's work to say his dad was sick made his first court appearance on Monday as prosecutors weighed whether to charge him as an adult.
Kai Kelly was arrested last week on suspicion of first-degree murder in the death of his father, Joseph Kelly, in the small mountain town of Gypsum, about 105 miles west of Denver.
Jill Sarmo, spokeswoman for the Eagle County District Attorney's Office, said the boy was appointed a public defender on Monday and will be formally charged at a later date. She said prosecutors have not decided whether to charge him as an adult.
Police uncovered the crime after the boy called his father's employer several days in a row to say his dad was sick and would not be coming to work, according to a statement from Eagle County Sheriff Joe Hoy.
The employer ultimately became suspicious and contacted police. When deputies arrived at the home, Kai Kelly told them his 50-year-old father was dead inside, police said.
The elder Kelly died from two gunshot wounds to the head fired from a .22-caliber rifle, Eagle County coroner Kara Bettis said.
"One (shot) was to the back of the head and one to the temple," Bettis told reporters, adding that the shot to the temple was a "contact" wound.
Based on the condition of the decomposing body, it appeared that the man had been dead for six days, Bettis said.
Authorities have not released a possible motive for the slaying but said Kai Kelly was under investigation for spray painting graffiti, and Joseph Kelly had failed to show for a meeting with police about the incident.
The sheriff said the boy's parents are divorced, but did not provide other details about the mother.
(Editing by Cynthia Johnston)
Monday, May 19, 2014
Inhumanity
Saudi Arabia employer 'pours boiling
water' on Filipino woman
The 23-year-old woman was left
with severe burns on her back and legs
The woman's cousin posted photographs
of her injuries on Facebook
By ANTONIA MOLLOY
Monday 19 May 2014
A Filipino woman was left with severe
burns after her Saudi Arabia employer
allegedly poured boiling water on her.
The 23-year-old household service
worker, from Pikit, North Cotabato,
suffered burns to her back and legs after
being doused with the scorching liquid in
the incident in Riyadh on 4 May, ABS-CBN
News reported.
Photos of Fatma, which is not her real
name, were posted by her cousin on
Facebook on Saturday in an appeal for
help.
According to ABS-CBN News, the mother
of Fatma’s employer became angry after
Fatma was slow to bring her coffee and
then poured boiling water on her.
Fatma was not taken to hospital for
several hours, but when there she was
able to contact relatives in the area by
giving a phone number to one of the
nurses.
She was saved by her cousin during a
further trip to the hospital.
Fatma has now been taken under the
wing of the Philippine Embassy.
A representative from the Department of
Social Welfare and Development said they
are providing her with medical treatment
and other necessities.
According to a study by the Committee on
Filipinos Overseas, 70 per cent of Filipino
domestic workers in Saudi Arabia have
reported physical and psychological
abuse.
Tales of mistreatment are common - and
not just among Filipinos.
Last year a young maid from Sri Lanka
was beheaded in the country after being
accused of killing her employer's four-
month-old baby.
And Indonesia banned its nationals from
working in Saudi Arabia when a maid was
beheaded after confessing to killing her
employer, claiming he abused her.
Inhumanity
Saudi Arabia employer 'pours boiling
water' on Filipino woman
The 23-year-old woman was left
with severe burns on her back and legs
The woman's cousin posted photographs
of her injuries on Facebook
By ANTONIA MOLLOY
Monday 19 May 2014
A Filipino woman was left with severe
burns after her Saudi Arabia employer
allegedly poured boiling water on her.
The 23-year-old household service
worker, from Pikit, North Cotabato,
suffered burns to her back and legs after
being doused with the scorching liquid in
the incident in Riyadh on 4 May, ABS-CBN
News reported.
Photos of Fatma, which is not her real
name, were posted by her cousin on
Facebook on Saturday in an appeal for
help.
According to ABS-CBN News, the mother
of Fatma’s employer became angry after
Fatma was slow to bring her coffee and
then poured boiling water on her.
Fatma was not taken to hospital for
several hours, but when there she was
able to contact relatives in the area by
giving a phone number to one of the
nurses.
She was saved by her cousin during a
further trip to the hospital.
Fatma has now been taken under the
wing of the Philippine Embassy.
A representative from the Department of
Social Welfare and Development said they
are providing her with medical treatment
and other necessities.
According to a study by the Committee on
Filipinos Overseas, 70 per cent of Filipino
domestic workers in Saudi Arabia have
reported physical and psychological
abuse.
Tales of mistreatment are common - and
not just among Filipinos.
Last year a young maid from Sri Lanka
was beheaded in the country after being
accused of killing her employer's four-
month-old baby.
And Indonesia banned its nationals from
working in Saudi Arabia when a maid was
beheaded after confessing to killing her
employer, claiming he abused her.
Courage:: The presence of something more important than fear
Defiled and bloody, tethered to a tree, school uniforms ripped: The moment I
rescued two girls from Boko Haram
Two teenage girls found tied to trees in a clearing in the Nigerian bush. Had been
beaten, raped and left to die in sweltering heat by Boko Haram. Found a week
after 276 girls were taken from a school in Ba’ale, Chibok. Found by Baba Goni,
15, who was held hostage by the group for two years before escaping. Here, the
brave young man tells of Boko Haram’s reign of terror in his village.
Their faces scratched and bleeding, the pitiful remains of their once-smart school
uniforms ripped and filthy, the two teenage girls were tethered to trees, wrists
bound with rope and left in a clearing in the Nigerian bush to die by Islamist terror
group Boko Haram.
Despite having been raped and dragged through the bush, they were alive – but
only just – in the sweltering tropical heat and humidity.
This grim scene was discovered by 15-year-old Baba Goni. “They were seated on
the ground at the base of the trees, their legs stretched out in front of them – they
were hardly conscious,” says Baba, who acted as a guide for one of the many
vigilante teams searching for the Nigerian schoolgirls abducted from their school
last month by Boko Haram – and now at the centre of a concerted international
campaign for their freedom.
The horrific scene he and his comrades encountered, a week after the kidnap early
on April 15, was in thorny scrubland near the village of Ba’ale, an hour’s drive
from Chibok, where 276 girls aged 16 to 18 were taken from their boarding school
dormitories – with 223 still missing. It was still two weeks before social media
campaigns and protests would prick the Western world’s conscience over the
abduction.
In the days following their disappearance, rag-tag groups such as Baba’s,
scouring the forests in a convoy of Toyota pick-up trucks, were the girls’ only
hope.
But hope had already run out for some of the hostages, according to Baba, when
his group spoke to the terrified inhabitants of the village where Boko Haram had
pitched camp with their captives for three days following the kidnap.
The chilling account he received from the villagers, though unconfirmed by official
sources, represents the very worst fears of the families of those 223 girls still
missing.
Four were dead, they told him, shot by their captors for being ‘stubborn and
unco-operative’. They had been hastily buried before the brutish kidnappers
moved on.
“Everyone we spoke to was full of fear,” said Baba. “They didn’t want to come out
of their homes. They didn’t want to show us the graves. They just pointed up a
track.”
The tiny rural village, halfway between Chibok and Damboa in the besieged state of
Borno in Nigeria’s north-east, had been helpless to stop the Boko Haram gang as
it swept through on trucks loaded with schoolgirls they had taken at gunpoint
before torching their school.
Venturing further up the track, Baba and his fellow vigilantes found the two girls.
Baba, the youngest of the group, stayed back as his friends took charge. “They
used my knife to cut through the ropes,” he said. “I heard the girls crying and
telling the others that they had been raped, then just left there. They had been
with the other girls from Chibok, all taken from the school in the middle of the
night by armed men in soldiers’ uniforms.
“We couldn’t do much for them. They didn’t want to talk to any men. All we could
do was to get them into a vehicle and drive them to the security police at
Damboa. They didn’t talk, they just held on to each other and cried.”
For Baba, a peasant farmer’s son who has never been out of rural Borno, it was
shocking to see young girls defiled and brutalised by the notorious terrorists he
knew so well.
But his own life has been full of tragedy and he told how he had ‘seen much
worse’ than the horror of that day in the forest clearing.
A bright-eyed Muslim boy from the Kanuri ethnic group, proud of a tribal facial
scar and nicknamed ‘Small’ by all who know him because of his short, slim
frame, he described a happy childhood with three brothers and two sisters in
Kachalla Burari, a collection of mudhouses not far from Chibok.
Without electricity or running water, the children spent their days helping on their
father’s subsistence farm, planting maize and beans and millet.
Baba and his friends used home-made catapults to shoot birds and in the rainy
season fished in the river with bent hooks. But by his tenth birthday, the scourge
of the radical Islamist Boko Haram was creeping up on everyone in Borno State.
Baba and his siblings attended a local madrassa, or religious school, where they
learnt the Koran, but he had no formal teaching and cannot read or write to this
day.
By 2009, Boko Haram were becoming active in his area, peddling their message of
hatred to Christians, but also turning on Muslims they branded as informers.
Nigeria’s chaotic military was incapable of defending itself or its citizens.
Baba’s village life came under siege. There were attacks on the Christian
population in the region, with bank robberies funding the gang. Disaffected,
unemployed youths from local families were recruited and neighbours who once
lived in peace now spied on one another.
One night as he slept in his family’s mudhouse in the village, the gunmen came
door to door, looking for informers. “I heard some noise, I woke up and saw men
coming through the door, shooting at my uncle who was in the bed beside mine,”
he said. “That was the end of my childhood, the end of everything. I saw his body
covered in blood, I backed away, and the men turned their guns on me. They
grabbed me roughly and took me outside to a pick-up truck.
Baba, telling his story confidently and lucidly, wants to skate over the details of his
two hellish years in the Boko Haram camp in Sambisa Forest. Today there are
Special Forces soldiers swarming over the vast nature reserve and circling
overhead in surveillance aircraft.
For this slight boy, there was no such worldwide interest as he scurried back and
forth at the command of a ruthless gang dug into woodland far from any help or
rescue.
He remembers many of them lived with women who had come voluntarily into the
camp. He never saw any girls abducted. This latest phenomenon is unknown to
him. “There were many abducted boys, but no girls,” he said.
“We were all scared to death and had to do whatever we were told – fetch water,
fetch firewood, clean the weapons.
“We couldn’t make friends – you didn’t know who to trust. I was made to sleep
next to the Boko Haram elders, the senior preachers. I had no special boss in the
camp, I was ordered around by everybody”.
The men prayed five times a day yet would leap on their motorbikes and trucks to
carry out killing sprees.
“I knew they had started out as holy men but now I saw them as criminals,
loaded with weapons and ammunition,” he said.
As he got older, he was taught how to use an AK-47, how to strip it down and
clean it, and reassemble it.
He could never understand what drove the men. They did not use alcohol or hard
drugs, though he sometimes saw them smoking marijuana. They were monsters
and he felt convinced they were mad.
“They were wild, even when they prayed so loudly in groups together, making us
join in. They were insane, unpredictable, and always planning their next attack. I
never wanted to be one of them.
“They slept rough every night, just taking shelter under trees in the rainy season,’
he said. ‘We all wore the same afaraja [the Nigerian long shift and trousers] day
and night. We washed them when we could. We slept on mats made of palm
leaves, out in the open with the trucks all parked nearby, ready for a hasty move if
necessary.”
He said the fear, and the endless boredom, were his worst enemies. “They made
us work hard so it was easy to sleep. I don’t remember crying through
homesickness. I think the night when my uncle was killed in front of me did
something to my feelings forever. It seems mindless, but I adapted to my life out
there.”
Then came the day when he was given a ‘special’ but sickening task. One of the
commanders told him he was going on a journey and would be tested for his
loyalty to the group.
“He brought two of his senior men to stand beside me. He said I would be going
with them to my family’s home and I would have to shoot and kill my father.”
Baba had no time to plan. He was sandwiched between the two fanatics as they
set off on a motorbike for his village home.
“I pretended I was willing to do the job. I took the ammunition belt I was handed
and clung on as we drove through the rough bush. When we were less than a mile
from a nearby village, I threw the ammunition belt to the ground and pretended it
had slid out of my hands.
“They stopped to let me pick it up. Instead, I ran as fast as I could through the
undergrowth. I didn’t care about thorns or snakes or anything. They shot at me
and I could hear the bullets flying past and hitting the trees, but I was not going to
stop for anything. I made it to the village and some kind people let me hide there.
“The shooting would have been heard by local vigilante groups. I think that is why
I wasn’t followed by the men on the bike.”
The next day Baba went home. He saw his grieving parents and siblings for the
first time in two years.
“But I couldn’t stay,’ he said. “I was bringing danger to their door and we all knew
it.”
Confirmation of that came when Baba soon heard that vengeful Boko Haram chiefs
had put a bounty on his head for his defiance of the equivalent of £12,000 – a
fortune in the local economy.
“I took a bus to Damboa, to report to the youth vigilante group,” he said. “I
wanted to work with them and I knew I was doing the right thing.”
His family, terrified, abandoned their home soon afterwards and today live in a
remote part of Borno, rarely seeing their eldest son. He lives with a cousin who is
also under a Boko Haram death threat.
He became a valuable volunteer with the vigilantes. He helps man checkpoints
where Baba points out members of Boko Haram to the rest of the team.
But he was soon exposed to brutality of a different kind – this time from the
government side. He helped to get one of his captors, a man he only knew as
Alhaji, arrested and handed to the soldiers.
“It felt good at first, but then they shot him dead right in front of me,” he said.
Now joining the patrols armed with a shotgun and machete, Baba has been able to
give valuable intelligence to the Nigerian authorities about Boko Haram’s way of
life in their camps.
“By now I have seen this violence many times. It never gets better. It will always
be an even worse sight than finding those poor schoolgirls in the forest,” he say
Sunday, May 18, 2014
All have erred on boko haram
I’ll raise up my hand and say I erred. When I first heard of Boko Haram
in 2009 ─ after the Bauchi uprising, followed by a three-day insurrection
in Maiduguri ─ I simply equated the group with the Maitatsine sect
which held Kano hostage in 1980. And as soon as the Boko Haram
leader, Mohammed Yusuf, was killed, I cheaply concluded that the fire
had been finally extinguished. This is just like the sect founded by
Alhaji Muhammadu Marwa Maitatsine, I told myself. It took the
President Shehu Shagari administration a few days to send Maitatsine
packing as things boiled over. After that, the sect could not raise its
head again. Boko Haram would go that way, I theorised.
Let’s refresh our memory. The Maitatsine sect had launched a campaign
of terror in the Yan Awaki quarters of Kano city on December 18, 1980.
They killed Christians and fellow Muslims. They burnt people’s houses
and cars, and overwhelmed the police. President Shagari had to call in
the military to quell the upheaval. Thousands of the fanatics were killed
in the operation. My cousins, who lived in Kano then, used to regale me
with stories of how trailers were used to pack dead bodies. Maitatsine
himself was arrested but died mysteriously in government custody,
reportedly from gunshot wounds. That, in effect, sent Maitatsine into
extinction.
And so here I was, thinking Boko Haram and Maitatsine were twin
brothers. A similar, naive assumption might have been made by our
security agencies when they cracked down on Boko Haram in 2009. The
late President Umaru Musa Yar’Adau, on the eve of a foreign trip, had
ordered the security forces to root out the group whose members were
on the rampage over the destruction of their houses and mosques and
the mass arrest of their “brethren” by the police. They were out for
revenge. A spokesperson for the group, identified as Abdullah, told
Reuters: “The police has been arresting our leaders that is why we
decided to retaliate.”
The Nigerian state erred. As the revolt spread to Maiduguri, with
thousands killed and Yusuf captured (he died in custody, like
Maitatsine), the security agencies hastily concluded that Boko Haram
had become history, like Maitatsine. But the “dead” Boko Haram would
go on to launch the country into an unprecedented reign of terror.
Regrettably, long before the insurrection, top members of Boko Haram,
notably Mamman Nur, had been arrested but released following “orders
from above”. Another error. Nur later masterminded the bombing of the
UN House, Abuja, in 2011, killing 16 persons. He is now at large. He is
probably next in hierarchy to Abubakar Shekau.
And then President Goodluck Jonathan erred. From the very beginning,
he had a “North” problem because of the circumstances under which he
came to power in 2010/11. He believed they did not like him and would
do anything to get him out of power. For a very long time, his
committee of conspiracy theorists kept telling him Boko Haram was
designed to fight him. It is because you’re a Christian; it is because
you’re a Southerner; it is because you are a minority; it is because of
zoning (“power rotation”); and all that. As his theorists worked hard on
him, Boko Haram was getting bolder and stronger and destroying
Nigeria.
And then Northerners erred. Rather than see Boko Haram for what it is
and begin to mobilise their community against it, they chose to
propound their own theories: Jonathan was the one sponsoring Boko
Haram in order to destroy the North; he was out discredit his political
opponents with a bombing campaign, just like Gen. Sani Abacha did to
NADECO in those days; and so on and so forth. Borno elders once
demanded that soldiers be withdrawn from their state! (Can you imagine
where Borno would be if Jonathan had listened to them?) Meanwhile, as
the Northern conspiracy theorists were propounding more theses and
hypotheses, Boko Haram continued to destroy the North.
And Southerners erred. Oh, break up the country! Let the North go! Let
them have their Islamic republic! Their politicians are behind Boko
Haram! Now, with the Chibok kidnappings and the realisation that most
of the girls are Christians, some Southerners are asking: “So they have
Christians in Borno?” And I tell them, Yes, they have Christians in
Zamfara! They have Christians in Kano! They have in Jigawa! Yobe!
Bauchi! Gombe! Kebbi! If you’ve been propagating your balkanisation
agenda in the hope that you are fighting only Northern Muslims, there
are millions of Christians who would suffer under a Boko Haram
government! Or you want to relocate them to the South and then tag
them “settlers” and begin to drive them away in another 50 years?
And, by the way, who said Northern Muslims want to be ruled by Boko
Haram? Who wants to live under a group that treats you as only “fit for
the grave” if you do not accept their theology? To these terrorists, any
Muslim who does not believe that “Boko” is “Haram” is as bad as a
Christian and should be packaged for the grave. Any Muslim who says
Islam means peace is a renegade that should be butchered. Evidently,
Boko Haram has killed more Muslims than Christians. Most of the towns
and villages they are destroying in Borno are predominantly Muslim. I
know that they naturally hate and target Christians, but should we
conveniently deny the fact that they have also killed Islamic clerics,
attacked Muslim traditional rulers and burnt mosques?
Let’s admit it: all of us have erred over Boko Haram. We made the
wrong assumptions and came to the wrong conclusions. It is now
getting clearer by the day that though they might have started as
religious partners to politicians, they are now a Frankenstein monster,
mad men on the loose. The Boko Haram of 2002 or 2009 is completely
different from the Boko Haram of today. They are a threat to all of us.
Your religion is of no significance to them. Your tongue means nothing
to them. Your political party is immaterial to them. Your age has no
meaning to them. We are dealing with fanatics and lunatics. The earlier
we woke up to the new reality, the better.
With that at the back of our minds, let us all come out of our error. PDP,
APC, Jonathan, media, elders, everybody – let’s admit we erred all
along. Let us now reason together on the best way to quench this fire. A
common enemy requires a common response from us. We are all
endangered. Let’s not deny it. Politics cannot be everything and
everything cannot be politics.
Eating humanitarian food meant for the hungry .....Ojuku's Biafra and Gowon's
#BringBackOurGirls: A
History of Humanitarian
Intervention in Nigeria
#BringBackOurGirls has become ubiquitous on
the internet, with a wide gamut of politicians and
celebrities taking up the cause of the nearly 300
Nigerian schoolgirls kidnapped by the terrorist
organization Boko Haram. While the efficacy of
this sort of hashtag activism, or slacktivism, has
been questioned by scholars —and openly
mocked by some conservatives—there can be
little question that more people are aware of the
plight of the captured Nigerian girls than before.
Public awareness is no doubt a good thing, but
that alone won’t bring the Nigerian girls back
home. This has left many Americans asking
what they and their government can do to help.
Under public pressure, President Barack Obama
has already sent a group of U.S. officials to
Nigeria to aid the search. The United States has
even sent drones to patrol Northeastern Nigeria,
although it’s unclear how useful the unmanned
aircraft will be.
But some very influential Americans are calling
for more. “If they knew where they were,”
Senator John McCain said when discussing the
crisis in Nigeria on May 14, 2014, “I certainly
would send in U.S. troops to rescue them, in a
New York minute, without permission of the host
country.” This is a “crime against humanity,”
the senator continued, and the United Nations
Charter “gives any nation the license if they can
stop a crime against humanity.” The United
States, McCain is arguing, has both the legal
and moral power to intervene in Nigeria in order
to find the missing children.
The United Nations Charter actually doesn’t
provide that kind of unilateral authority. After all,
the words “crime against humanity” are
nowhere to be found in the document, and it is
unclear whether appealing to human rights, or
the even vaguer notion of dignity, would win him
any more supporters on the side of unilaterally
involving the American military in Nigeria.
Still, the senator raises an important issue: the
historical relationship between state sovereignty
and humanitarian intervention. The concept of
state sovereignty was codified into international
law at the end of the Thirty Years’ War. By
creating a system in which states agreed not to
interfere in the internal affairs of other states, the
Westphalian Peace acted as a humanitarian
safeguard. In addition to ending countless years
of religious wars, it provided protection to the
citizens and subjects of sovereign states.
But Senator McCain’s understanding of
sovereignty and humanitarian intervention in
Nigeria is a product of a much more recent
past. It was during another conflict in Nigeria—
the Nigerian Civil War—that the moral and legal
framework for violating state sovereignty in the
name of humanitarian relief came to the
forefront of international politics.
The Nigerian Civil War was a thirty-month
struggle that became famous, or perhaps
infamous, in the summer of 1968 because of the
images of starving women and children and the
concomitant accusation that the Nigerian
government was committing genocide against
the people living in the secessionist state of
Biafra. As in the current situation unfolding in
northeastern Nigeria, many Americans saw
those pictures and asked how they could help
people living half a world away. Their efforts
were stymied, however, because both sides of
the war wanted to control the relief effort — in
effect to claim sovereignty over humanitarian
aid — which meant that large stock piles of food
never reached the neediest until the war ended
in January 1970.
Protest in New York City in 1969 calling for
international intervention in Nigerian Civil War
(Photos by Maury Englander and Brad
Lyttle, Swarthmore College Peace Collection)
The historical comparisons between the Nigerian
Civil war and the present crisis are of course not
exact. No one, for example, discussed placing
American boots on the ground during the
Nigerian Civil War and the conditions that
created the civil war were different than the
present problems. We can nonetheless draw
three broad parallels about how Americans
viewed themselves in relationship to
humanitarian intervention then and now.
The first is that state sovereignty has become
largely viewed as an impediment to
humanitarianism rather than a fulfillment of a
humanitarian promise. During the Nigerian Civil
War, with relief at an impasse, Americans
founded over 200 non-governmental and
voluntary organizations that pressured the
United States government to intervene. Like
many other groups, the American Committee to
Keep Biafra Alive argued that the United States
had a right to intervene in the civil war. In
September 1968, committee members presented
a brief to State Department officials that argued
the violation of sovereignty had a long legal
tradition that could be invoked in the case of the
Nigerian Civil War. In the end, however, the
committee offered not a legal justification for
humanitarian intervention but a moral one: “If
we cannot perfect, as a minimum, a system of
humanitarian intervention, we have lost our
humanity. If we sit passively by while the
[Biafrans] suffer genocide, we have forfeited our
right to regain it.”
This might sound good, but then as now
American leaders were skeptical about how this
would work in practice. Even if we all agreed
that in certain cases sovereignty should be
violated for humanitarian relief, who makes that
determination? Individual governments? Surely
not. The United Nations? Maybe, but even then
the violation of sovereignty for the noblest of
purposes would be a tough sell to the
international community, especially to the
developing world who for centuries had been
victims of European imperialism. In the 1960s,
U.S. officials dismissed the idea of humanitarian
intervention in the Nigerian Civil War precisely
because it would set an uncontrollable
precedent. “One requires no Calvinist
predilections to see that governments are not
essentially good enough to be trusted with a
rule which allows them to exercise force against
another country when they believe it would
serve the ends of human rights to do so,” one
State Department representative said. Senator
McCain, for his part, said “I wouldn’t be waiting
for some kind of permission from some guy
named Goodluck Jonathan,” referring to the
current Nigerian president, before sending
American troops. There is no doubt that
President Obama would receive President
Jonathan’s permission before the United States
does anything more in Nigeria.
President Goodluck Jonathan (2nd from left) on
a state visit to South Africa (Photo: GCIS via
Flickr)
The second conclusion builds on the first, which
is the unquestioned assumption that American
humanitarian intervention has a long past and is
always welcomed. During the Nigerian Civil War,
Senator Edward Kennedy demanded that
President Lyndon Johnson create a special
coordinator to facilitate relief in Nigeria. Kennedy
offered the examples of two Herberts, Hoover
and Lehman , as Americans who had gone to
Europe and had broken through diplomatic
logjams to feed starving people. “The United
States has always found a way to make its
weight felt in the affairs of others when our
political self-interest and national security have
been at stake,” Kennedy wrote to the president.
“In the historic tradition of our nation, I would
also hope that we can still exert our powerful
influence when great human tragedy strikes our
fellow man.”
There is little doubt that McCain feels the same
way today about finding the kidnapped girls as
Kennedy did about using American resources
and manpower to save lives in Biafra. “I would
not be involved in the niceties of getting the
Nigerian government to agree,” McCain said,
“because if we did rescue these people, there
would be nothing but gratitude from the
Nigerian government.” Yet in the 1960s, Roger
Morris, a staff member on the National Security
Council, warned against this type of thinking.
“Here I think we have to remind [Kennedy] once
more that black post-colonial Nigeria is not
white post-war Europe.” In the era of
decolonization, Morris said, Nigerians “regard
the Hoovers and Lehmans as unwanted alien
intruders, rather than angels of mercy.”
American-led humanitarianism, regardless of
motive, undermines the authority of
governments and wasn’t welcomed during the
Nigerian Civil War. It certainly wouldn’t be
welcomed today in the way that Senator McCain
believes.
Finally, McCain’s response to the kidnapped
girls demonstrates the historical link between
modern neo-conservative foreign policy and the
liberal moral foreign policy reawakening that
occurred during the 1960s. Supporters of
humanitarianism in Biafra—liberals being the
most prominent and vocal—claimed that a
vision of morality should infuse and guide
American foreign policy. Norman Cousins, editor
of the Saturday Review , said that for too long
the United States misplaced its priorities in
pursuit of winning the Cold War. “Why is the
national interest so often associated with power
plays and not with those great thrusts of the
moral imagination that in then end determine a
people’s place in history?” Cousins asked.
Indeed, humanitarianism during the Nigerian
Civil War was not just a guiding light for the
future but a way of atoning for the Cold War
sins of the past.
While McCain doesn’t explicitly mention
morality and American foreign policy in relation
to the current Nigerian situation, we can see
how his opinion has been shaped by a unique,
neo-conservative view of the past that has its
origins in the 1960s. Whether in Iraq, Syria , or
Ukraine , McCain has repeatedly called for the
use of American power to enforce moral norms
—a “ weaponization of human rights ” put forward
most openly by current U.N. Ambassador
Samantha Power. Of course, these ideas have
been challenged, and since the wars in Iraq and
Afghanistan Americans have been favoring a
less interventionist foreign policy. Nevertheless,
humanitarianism as a guide for American
foreign policy historically emerges during
periods when the soul of American foreign
policy seems in flux, and in many ways the
same conditions that allowed for the emergence
of humanitarianism and human rights to
become attractive alternatives to the foreign
policy status quo during the late 1960s and
1970s have reemerged in the aftermath of the
wars Iraq and Afghanistan.
It is still unclear what new alternatives will
emerge. Perhaps human rights will again
provide a path toward a utopian future. The
problem, as I see it, is that appealing to
normative legal and moral standards have so far
produced mixed results at best. For the United
States, however, the greatest factor limiting
American foreign policy in enforcing
humanitarian and human rights is the gap
between its rhetoric and its intentions. Even if
we can give Senator McCain the benefit of the
doubt and believe that he has nothing but pure
and altruistic motives for violating Nigerian
sovereignty, the real history of American
intervention in the world is one of using moral
language and rhetoric to serve its own
geopolitical interests. Nigerians would be right
to be skeptical of American motives here,
especially the kind of unilateral intervention
envisaged by Senator McCain. Let’s hope that
Nigerians are peacefully able to bring back their
own girls. And if the United States does help,
let’s hope it’s because President Obama first
received the request from President Goodluck
Jonathan.
Lucky but shameless
Lucky Igbinedion’s insulting crows in the media of late clearly shows the evil of
legal technicality and the dysfunction of plea bargaining in the face of worsening
sleaze and corruption.
Igbinedion, convict and best forgotten former governor of Edo State, has suddenly
found his voice. He is no thief, he brazenly says in a new media campaign swing,
simply because the state he allegedly raped was too poor to be stolen from!
Disingenuous, isn’t it?
But it is not Igbinedion’s fault. It is the fault of the Economic and Financial Crimes
Commission (EFCC). EFCC abandoned a 191-count charge of alleged sleaze to
hastily settle for Igbinedion’s guilty plea for not declaring the cash in an account
no: 4124013983110, with an unnamed new generation bank, contrary to the
provision of Section 27 (3) of the EFCC Act 2008. In exchange, Igbinedion plea-
bargained to forfeit the N3.5 million in that account.
So, by that stroke of what looked like legal legerdemain, Igbinedion escaped gaol
on December 17, 2008, in Justice Abdul Kafarati’s court, even if the convict was
a pitiful sight in the dock before the great escape.
Six years on, the convict has suddenly found his voice! In decent societies, even
lucky outcasts should know when and how not to talk. Igbinedion may have been
lucky to escape the monumental gaol his alleged humongous sleaze, if proven,
should have fetched him.
But he is still a convict. So, he should not delude himself that he could go on a
media binge to say whatever he likes, within the ambit of the law. That is the
confine of spotless citizens, which Igbinedion is not.
Indeed, what Igbinedion said and how he said it were most insulting and
unconscionable. Even the matter of his conviction: if his motives were pure, why
did he, like a petty criminal, try to hide that he had N3.5 million in an account in
his name? Selective amnesia? Or petty but stupid lying?
And the scandalous evocation of the Zairean Mobutu in the local Edo economy!
Like Mobutu, the monumental thief who loaned his country money from the trove
he had looted from it, Lucky claimed he borrowed money from certain individuals
to run his bankrupt state!
Are these individuals then richer than a state with monthly allocations from the
Federation Account, aside from locally raised revenue? By the way, were these
loans receipted? What interest rates were paid on them — or were they interest-
free, coming from super-benevolent patriots to a failed and banana state? And
how did the patriotic prodigal repay the debt, after eight useless years in office —
or was there patriotic debt forgiveness?
Whatever direction, Igbinedion’s claims stink — and he ought to be thoroughly
ashamed of himself.
Curiously enough, after Igbinedion’s tenure of infamy and the sorry bid of his
party, the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP), to rig in a successor to cover his
notorious tracks collapsed, new Governor Adams Oshiomhole suddenly found the
golden pot the prodigal Igbinedion could not find in eight years!
Now, how does the scion of Edo feel driving on the enhanced roads and other
renewed infrastructure of Benin, his hometown — like some useless child who,
with contempt, points at his ancestral home with his left index finger?
Indeed, the alleged sleaze from which Igbinedion is trying childish pranks to
distance himself, simply because he escaped gaol, is not unlike what the Jewish
would call chutzpah: a child commits parricide by killing both of his parents. Yet,
he has the satanic nerves to plead with the court to please set him free, simply
because he is an orphan!
It was clear to anyone that the Igbinedion gubernatorial era was a disaster. He
neither had the temper nor the gravity to be a governor of legacy. Indeed, a tale
made the round after his first term about his father, the Esama, reportedly pleading
that even if his son had not done well — which was so clear he hadn’t — at least
he should earn a chance for a re-sit, like a failed university student! It was
probably an apocryphal tale. But it did capture the spirit of Lucky Igbinedion’s
unlucky era of waste and purposelessness.
Of course, Igbinedion is well established in the infamous class of the PDP era in
several states: Anambra, Ekiti, Ondo, Oyo, Osun — worthless governors who
claimed there was no money to deliver services, only to be proved wrong by their
immediate successors.
Between Igbinedion and Oshiomhole, the Edo people know who has raped and who
has served them. Igbinedion should find other ways to exhibit his guilt complex,
when his conscience tells him he should be in gaol. He should stop insulting the
rest of us with his tales by the moonlight.
Man dies digging grave to steal skull
DESPITE the increase in cases of jungle justice
being meted out to suspected kidnappers and
ritualists lately, most especially in Oyo, Ogun,
Osun and other states, some desperate ritualists
are still not deterred by these horrible deaths, as
an unidentified young man in Ilobu community, in
the Irepodun Local Government Area of Osun
State, met his Waterloo in the early hours of
Wednesday while attempting to cut off the head of
a corpse, buried in Tonto compound in the area.
The suspect’s accomplices fled in terror after
seeing half his body get stuck mysteriously in the
grave. His death has generated concern among
the terrified residents of the Ilobu community.
Saturday Tribune gathered that the victim and his
partners in crime allegedly came to Tonto
compound in the early hours of Wednesday with a
plot to exhume the corpse of an aged woman and
sever her decomposed head, allegedly for ritual
purposes.
A credible source in the community, who did not
want to be named, told Saturday Tribune that
“this particular corpse was buried five years ago
and the suspected ritualist attended the burial in
Ilobu.”
He explained: “There are indications that he did
not dig the grave alone. What we discovered is
that he may have been attempting to cut off the
head of the corpse when something suddenly
hooked him as he managed to force half of his
body into the grave to cut off the head.
“He got hooked and died on the spot, a
development which possibly compelled other
ritualists to run away from the scene so that they
may not be affected by the mysterious thing that
killed (their colleague).”
While commenting on how the residents of Ilobu
got to know about the incident, since it happened
in the wee hours, the source said a woman who
was hawking ogi (a local corn meal) early in the
morning of Wednesday spotted the torso of the
suspect sticking out of the grave and raised the
alarm.
“His corpse was discovered around 6.30am and
his head was covered in mud. The residents here
alerted the police division in Ilobu and they later
came to evacuate the body and put it in their van
before taking him away,” he said.
Saturday Tribune was informed that the remains
of the suspected ritualist were subsequently taken
to and deposited at the mortuary of the Ladoke
Akintola University Teaching Hospital (LAUTECH),
Osogbo, the state capital.
When contacted, the Commissioner of Police in
Osun State, Mr Ibrahim Maishanu, said he was
aware of the incident, and that the police would
conduct investigation to determine what led to the
suspect’s death.
He said the police could not confirm that the
suspect was a ritualist because of the
circumstances surrounding the discovery of his
corpse at a grave in Ilobu; that they would have to
investigate the matter before giving any concrete
information on the incident.
A few weeks ago, no fewer than four suspected
kidnappers were burnt to death in Osogbo and
Ikire after they were accused of kidnapping.
Worried by the development, Maishanu, on
Tuesday after the state security council meeting in
the Government House, said “the act of (meting
out) jungle justice to suspects is barbaric,
uncivilised and unacceptable. The security
agencies will not fold their arms and watch our
society descend into anarchy.
“By this, , any person or group of persons that
constitutes a mob, takes laws into their hands
and lynches any suspect is not morally or legally
better than the suspects. Such person or group of
persons will be caught and made to face murder
charges, which is punishable by death.”
being meted out to suspected kidnappers and
ritualists lately, most especially in Oyo, Ogun,
Osun and other states, some desperate ritualists
are still not deterred by these horrible deaths, as
an unidentified young man in Ilobu community, in
the Irepodun Local Government Area of Osun
State, met his Waterloo in the early hours of
Wednesday while attempting to cut off the head of
a corpse, buried in Tonto compound in the area.
The suspect’s accomplices fled in terror after
seeing half his body get stuck mysteriously in the
grave. His death has generated concern among
the terrified residents of the Ilobu community.
Saturday Tribune gathered that the victim and his
partners in crime allegedly came to Tonto
compound in the early hours of Wednesday with a
plot to exhume the corpse of an aged woman and
sever her decomposed head, allegedly for ritual
purposes.
A credible source in the community, who did not
want to be named, told Saturday Tribune that
“this particular corpse was buried five years ago
and the suspected ritualist attended the burial in
Ilobu.”
He explained: “There are indications that he did
not dig the grave alone. What we discovered is
that he may have been attempting to cut off the
head of the corpse when something suddenly
hooked him as he managed to force half of his
body into the grave to cut off the head.
“He got hooked and died on the spot, a
development which possibly compelled other
ritualists to run away from the scene so that they
may not be affected by the mysterious thing that
killed (their colleague).”
While commenting on how the residents of Ilobu
got to know about the incident, since it happened
in the wee hours, the source said a woman who
was hawking ogi (a local corn meal) early in the
morning of Wednesday spotted the torso of the
suspect sticking out of the grave and raised the
alarm.
“His corpse was discovered around 6.30am and
his head was covered in mud. The residents here
alerted the police division in Ilobu and they later
came to evacuate the body and put it in their van
before taking him away,” he said.
Saturday Tribune was informed that the remains
of the suspected ritualist were subsequently taken
to and deposited at the mortuary of the Ladoke
Akintola University Teaching Hospital (LAUTECH),
Osogbo, the state capital.
When contacted, the Commissioner of Police in
Osun State, Mr Ibrahim Maishanu, said he was
aware of the incident, and that the police would
conduct investigation to determine what led to the
suspect’s death.
He said the police could not confirm that the
suspect was a ritualist because of the
circumstances surrounding the discovery of his
corpse at a grave in Ilobu; that they would have to
investigate the matter before giving any concrete
information on the incident.
A few weeks ago, no fewer than four suspected
kidnappers were burnt to death in Osogbo and
Ikire after they were accused of kidnapping.
Worried by the development, Maishanu, on
Tuesday after the state security council meeting in
the Government House, said “the act of (meting
out) jungle justice to suspects is barbaric,
uncivilised and unacceptable. The security
agencies will not fold their arms and watch our
society descend into anarchy.
“By this, , any person or group of persons that
constitutes a mob, takes laws into their hands
and lynches any suspect is not morally or legally
better than the suspects. Such person or group of
persons will be caught and made to face murder
charges, which is punishable by death.”
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