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Nigeria: Civil Liberties Organization, 1
Nigeria: Civil Liberties Organization, 1
Date distributed (ymd): 980107
Document reposted by APIC
CORRECTION: In the posting on January 2, 1998, the URL reference to
a site on El Nino contained a misprint (nooa instead of noaa). The correct
URL is:
http://www.ogp.noaa.gov/enso/africa.html
+++++++++++++++++++++Document Profile+++++++++++++++++++++
Region: West Africa
Issue Areas: +political/rights+
Summary Contents: This posting contains part 1 of a year-end summary report
on human rights from the Civil Liberties Organization, Nigeria, as well
as pointers to other recent documents on Nigeria. The CLO report was originally
posted on the Usenet newsgroup soc.culture.nigeria
by the Nigerian Democratic Movement (NDM; e-mail: ndmorg@cldc.howard.edu),
as OPPRESSION WATCH 22 (December 20, 1997). This and other postings on
Usenet newsgroups can be located on the Web by using a search engine which
includes Usenet (such as http://www.dejanews.com).
Part 2 is in the next posting.
+++++++++++++++++end profile++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
For recent news on Nigeria, see
http://www.africanews.org/west/nigeria
For a even wider variety of news sources see
http://odili.net/newswires.html
For an archive of action-oriented documents from the shellnigeria -action
listserv, see
http://www.essential.org/listproc/shell-nigeria-action/
Important documents recently distributed on that listserv include news
articles on the Abacha regime's lobbying efforts involving businessman
Gilbert Chagoury, National Baptist leader Rev. Henry Lyons, and DC Mayor
Marion Barry; the World Council of Churches September 1997 statement on
Nigeria; news of the successful naming of Kudirat Abiola Corner in New
York City; and comments on other current developments in Nigeria. To subscribe
to the listserv send the message "subscribe shell-nigeria-action [your
name]" to listproc@essential.org.
A CIVIL LIBERTIES ORGANIZATION (CLO) SPECIAL REPORT
HUMAN RIGHTS UPDATE ON NIGERIA
NIGERIA: ONSLAUGHT ON THE OPPOSITION INTENSIFIES
- YAR'ADUA, USIKPEKO DIE IN PRISON
- OBASANJO IN COMA
- ANXIETY MOUNTS ON FATE OF OTHER PRISONERS
- PERSECUTION HEIGHTENS
INTRODUCTION
From direct threats of hostility to actual consummation of same, the
Gen. Sani Abacha regime has clearly acquired the image of a regime that
harbours, a most insignificant if any tolerance at all for the opposition.
The list of political detainees lengthens virtually daily even as relations
of those government considers as rebels suffer untold harassment, sometimes
culminating in detention that stretches for weeks and even months. This
year alone, Mrs Ladi Olorunyo has been arrested and detained twice for
no other reason than the fact that she is married to Dapo Olorunyomi, Deputy
Editor-in-Chief of Independent Communication (publishers of The News and
Tempo) who is currently in exile.
Today, activists in exile are in fact, as many as those in detention,
each of them having to escape into safety after series of unmistakable
threats to their lives even after some of them had been detained for several
months. Pa Anthony Enahoro (in his 70s) and Chief Cornelius Adebayo, both
leaders of the National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) were in 1995 detained
for more than eighty days without any charge. Before they were picked up,
Chief Frank Kokori, former Secretary General of NUPENG had been and he
is still there. Although the likes of Chiefs Enahoro and Adebayo had to
forcibly abandon the comfort of their homes, others like Pa Alfred Rewane
and Alhaja Kudirat Abiola (wife of detained Bashorun Abiola, winner of
the June 12 Presidential election) were not lucky. They were hacked to
death by those suspected to be government agents. Till date, the Nigerian
Police has not come up with any discovery on the death of these two prominent
Nigerians.
YAR'ADUA'S DEATH AND PRISON CONDITIONS
The death, on Monday December 8, 1997 of the former Number two citizen
of Nigeria, Retired Major Gen. Shehu Musa Yar'adua, has further confirmed
reports by Human Rights activists, former prisoners and even the prison
authorities about the deplorable situation of Nigeria prison system. Recounts
Chima Ubani, Head of Human Rights Education Project of the Civil Liberties
Organisation (CLO) detained between July 1995 and October 1996;
BEGIN QUOTE:
"It is quite easy to see how a detainee or prisoner can die in
custody. First of all in Ikoyi Prison there is no standard medical facility.
During the periods I was there, Ikoyi prisons had no doctors at its clinics.
All they had was a matron who did he diagnosis which at best is incompetent.
Based on that, she will make prescription and then the medicine will not
be there. Then the prisoner is now required to find a way of buying the
medicine. And in prison, you have no income and have no access the outside
world.
What this translates to is that the prisoner now has to find a way of
contacting his relations with this prescription and wait until his people
bring the medicine. In the process, valuable time that can make difference
between life and death is lost.
If you are a political detainee it is worse because prisoners had visiting
days on Monday, Wednesdays and Fridays from morning to 3.pm. Crowds usually
come for these visits. But for the political prisoners he is not entitled
to any visit by Decree 2. at sickness you are at the mercy of the matron.
If you are lucky they may have panadol or chloroquine. At a point when
I was sick the matron diagnosed malaria and prescribed chloroquine.
The drug is not even given to you. The notion is that you might take
overdose and commit suicide with it in your cell. The matron gave me some
tablets two of which were chloroquine, one capsule say of tetracycline
and the other were panadol. As a lay man, I know that a dosage is 4 tablets
of chloroquine. So I complained and then she made it four. Ikoyi is supposed
to be a highbrow prison. So if it is this bad, you can imagine what goes
on in Abakaliki prison.
The theory here is that if the condition is not bad you are supposed
to be taken to Kirikiri where they have a doctor. But I never went there
so I can't verify. But in practice I saw a lot of inmates sick to the point
of death and there were no federal vehicles to take them to Kirikiri. Even
to take persons to court it was BlackMaria. There was a time of epidemic
that caused stooling contacted by a lot of awaiting-trial persons. They
were stooling and vomiting, that was in late 1996, August or September.
Sometimes you will have 2-3 deaths in a day until it got to an unbearable
situation when the inmates rioted and broke open the roof into the yard.
Mobile policemen were brought in to quell the riot and the deputy controller
of Ikoyi prisons was removed.
Even with the best medical facilities, the conditions are at horrible
levels. Nutrition is appalling which affects ones immunity to sickness.
Throughout three weeks I was at Ikoyi, I was served beans for breakfast,
not the type properly prepared and th it was of small quantity. This was
breakfast everyday. In the afternoon, everyday except on Sunday it was
eba with very watery soup and in the evenings it was either amala or eba
with same kind of watery soup. On Sunday afternoon we were served coloured
rice called jollof rice. Taken together, it is a starvation diet. It is
easy to see how a man's immune system can collapse.
This lack of proper diet is complimented by unhygenic living conditions.
At least I can speak authoritatively on the awaiting trial sections. Cells
are congested without toilet and bathroom facilities. In my own cell called
'B ward single' which is ordinarily meant for one person had eight persons.
It was even considered privilege because it had a waste bin serving as
toilet. And when you want to ease yourself you can use the blanket to screen
off yourself. The filled bucket stays there throughout the day until the
following morning when it is evacuated by some of the convicted prisoners.
Another corner of same cell-served us as bathroom, drained by a hole at
the wall. It was meant for passage of water. Wale Oshun former Secretary
of NADECO, Chief Adisa Akinloye and John Odum of NUBIFIE had passed through
this same cell. For those of us who were considered privileged, we had
blanket, mattresses and bed. But for others there was nothing like these
and for the vast majority not even mats. In such cells there were about
80 to 100 persons. I know this because every morning the warder will come
to take inventory of every member of each cell to ensure no escape and
how many to feed. And this is announced to the hearing of us all.
Ventilation was another thing, except for fancy blocks with holes. In
the general cell there are windows mostly one each, so there is no cross
ventilation. This made spread of skin rashes, tuberculosis fast, which
is why most inmates are walking skeletons.
Warders pilfer prison food. Senior warders diverted prisoner's food.
When the riot of 1996 broke out, the Controller-General of Prisons in Lagos
visited the prison. Because the inmates were up in arms, he set up a forum
in which each cell nominated ea person to testify about the cause of the
riot. The single cell nominated me. One of the allegation inmate made was
the pilfering of inmates food and funds meant for them. At the end, prison
officials were either retired and redeployed. It was during his period
that I was released. Basic toiletries such as soap, insecticide etc are
provided for in the budget but never released. And a vast majority of these
inmates have been abandoned by their people. Perhaps, after getting tired
of waiting long fo their release.
Prisons need to be decongested. There are more inmates than the prisons
were built to accommodate. It seems there are more inmates the government
can cope for either because it cannot provide for them or deliberately
keeping them in those conditions as art of a general punishment.
In Ikoyi prison, the Monday following the last Saturday of every month
you see youngmen and women. They have been picked up on environmental sanitation
days. And believe you me some may stay for years. So such persons whose
offences are of such nature should be released."
END QUOTE
Only on October 5 this year, Reth Adeloye of Fame Magazine died two
weeks after he was released from police custody. His death was believed
to have stemmed from the unhealthy condition of the environment in which
he was detained. In 1995 also, a MOSOP a activist, Clement Tusima, detained
in Port Harcourt died inside prison on August 14, 1995 due to harsh prison
condition and series of torture by the agents of Internal Security Task
Force (ISTF). The late MOSOP activist was said to have fed on small quantities
of food and dirty water glaringly unfit for human consumption.
YAR'ADUA
Fifty-four (54) year old Gen Yar'Adua retired from the Army at the age
of 39 in 1979 after he had been appointed as the Supreme Headquarters in
the Gen. Obasanjo regime. After his retirement, Yar'Adua went into politics
and reached a prominent height during the government of Gen. Ibrahim Babangida
when he sought to become the President on the ticket of the Social Democratic
Party (SDP) before Babangida annulled the primary election in which he
beat Chief Olu Falae and others.
Yar'Adua bounced back into a heightened political activism in 1994 when
he and some of his political associates in the People's Democratic Movement
(PDM) contested and won the delegates to the National Constitutional Conference
convened by the Gen. Abach government. On December 6 1994, a major agenda
of Yar'Adua and his lieutenants crystallised into reality when the conference
passed a motion calling on the Abacha government to hand over power to
democratically elected president in January 1996. Four months later, Gen.
Yar'Adua was arrested by a 16-man team of uniformed and plain-clothed security
agents on the trumped charge of being involved in the alleged 1995 coup.
It was the beginning of his journey to the end.
Yar'adua died after he had slumped twice on Sunday December 7 and December
8, 1997. Following the alarming degeneracy that his health suffered on
those two days, Yar'adua was rushed to the University of Nigeria Teaching
Hospital (UNTH) Enugu 4.30p.m on December 8, 1997 in a convoy of military
and police vehicles. He reportedly died before the hospital team could
attend to him. "We were actually assembled by the CMD (Chief Medical
Director). But we could not do anything because by the time we came to
the man, he was already dead" a hospital source was quoted as saying
(The Guardian, Thursday, December 11, 1997). The Guardian further reported
that a doctor at UNTH who pleaded anonymity said the late Yar'adua had
intermittently taken ill for about one year before his death. Ebonyi State
Administrator, Commander Walter Feghabor was said to have informed the
Federal Government on December 1 that Yar'adua needed medical attention.
It is not clear if any steps were taken by the Government to provide adequat
treatment for Yar'Adua.
Although Yar'adua was said to have been intermittently ill over time,
the spokesman of UNTH Donatus Egere in an interview with The Punch stated
that "official records do not show that Gen. Yar'adua or anybody else
like that was a patient here". (The Punch, Thursday, December 11,
1997).
In its reaction to Yar'Adua's death, the United Action Democracy (UAD)
a coalition of human rights and pro-democracy groups declared that it placed
"the responsibility for this death squarely at the door step of Abacha
dictatorship" adding that he may no have received prompt and adequate
medical attention?."
The CLO asks "How many more" must die behind bars or in chains
because the military dictators of this country refused to do the right
thing?
National Democratic Coalition (NADECO) summed them up: "if it could
happen to Yar'Adua who is a prince, a former army general and an advocate
of justice, then nobody is safe"
OTHER POLITICAL DETAINEES
OBASANJO
Gen. Olusegun Obasanjo, reportedly slumped into coma after hearing the
story of Yar'adua's death. According to PM News edition of December 12,
1997, Gen Obasanjo was so devastated that he fainted immediately the news
was broken to him and even slumped to coma. The paper further reported
that the presidency was immediately notified and has since dispatched a
medical team to Yola Prisons, where Obasanjo is being held.
ABIOLA
Relations of the detained winner of the June 12, 1993 presidential election
Bashorun MKO Abiola on Wednesday December 10, 1997 raised alarm on the
fate of the detained politician. In a statement signed by Adebisi, Abiola's
wife, the family claimed that was shocked by Gen. Yar'adua's death adding
that it is a source of "genuine fears about Abiola's condition".
The letter reads in part:
"The news of the death of Major-General Shehu Musa Yar'adua at
the University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital, Enugu, while serving a 25-year
jail term at Abakaliki Prisons came as a rude shock to the family of Bashorun
M.K.O Abiola, and we are yet to come to terms with the reality of his demise...
Meanwhile, I seize this opportunity to appeal to General Sani Abacha to
allow the immediate family, as well as the personal physician, Dr. Ore
Falomo, access to Bashorun Kashimawo Olawale Abiola to ascertain the state
of his health. Persistent request from us to see the Bashorun have been
turned down by The Presidency. Dr. Ore Falomo was last allowed to see him
in March - about eight months ago! With the sudden death of General Yar'Adua,
due to health complications, I have genuine fears about Abiola's condition.
In the true spirit of national reconciliation, General Abacha should release
all detainees immediately. I beg all Nigerians to join us in pleading with
General Abacha to set our husbands, fathers, brothers and sisters free
while they are alive. The nation cannot afford to see Bashorun MKO Abiola
and all other political detainees die in detention camps and prisons. Please,
Abacha let them go!"
Meanwhile, Dr. Ore Falomo has stated (Weekend Concord December 13, 1997)
that "Abiola has always been in danger because he is in detention...
he is safer in his house than being in prison... Nothing is better than
his own house and his own bed. No matte what they try to do to make him
comfortable, he would be better off in his house". Reacting to the
question on the possibility of Abiola' being injected with AIDS virus,
Falomo remarks that "anything is possible". He added "The
HIV... have been injecte by a medical man into a woman whom I think had
a quarrel... Now under detention anything is possible".
OGAGA IFOWODO
He is CLO's Project Officer in charge of Annual Report Project. Ogaga
was arrested at Seme Border town on November 7 when he was returning from
the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) which held in Scotland
in October 1997. He was kept at 15 Awolowo Road Ikoyi office of the State
Security Service (SSS) for about two weeks. He has since been moved to
another detention facility called Inter-Centre. The duo of Abdul Oroh and
Chima Ubani- Executive Director and Head of Human Rights Education project
of CLO respectively - spent nine months there. Since his incarceration,
Ogaga has been denied access to his lawyers, doctors and relations who
have all made efforts to visit him.
PERSECUTION HEIGHTENS
The Gen. Sani Abacha-headed military government has in the recent time
intensified efforts to further reduce the opposition, especially the independent
press, to a more insignificant size. This it has been doing by outrightly
abducting and arresting mo journalists, human rights activists and political
activists.
In some other cases still, victims are threatened to leave the country
or lose their lives. The situation adds another dimension to the strategy
it employed in February and March 1997 when it conducted the Local Government
election. Then, a number of opposition politicians and human rights activists
were arrested and hurriedly arraigned before a court for having hands in
the spate of bombing incidents the nation was witnessing. All those so
arraigned are still in detention (except those already in exile.)
In the prevailing circumstance, no charges have yet been framed even
as the election into the state houses of assembly has been concluded while
no explanation are offered either.
[continued in part 2]
FOR FURTHER ENQUIRIES CONTACT
MR TUNDE AKANNI, HEAD OF CAMPAIGN,
CIVIL LIBERTIES ORGANISATION
DECEMBER, 1997
CLO, 24 Mbonu Ojike St., Off Alhaji Masha Road, Surulele, Lagos, Nigeria.
Tel: 015-840288, 848513, 836972; fax: 5876876.
This material is being reposted for wider distribution by the Africa
Policy Information Center (APIC), the educational affiliate of the Washington
Office on Africa. APIC's primary objective is to widen the policy debate
in the United States around African issues and the U.S. role in Africa,
by concentrating on providing accessible policy-relevant information and
analysis usable by a wide range of groups individuals.
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