July 13
SUDAN:
Sudan defends human rights record before UNHRC committee
A committee of experts at the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) in
Geneva expressed concern over the continuation of war crimes, torture and
arrests in Sudan and criticized Khartoum's insistence on the application of the
death penalty, citing the case of Mrs. Mariam Ibrahim who was sentenced to
death over apostasy.
Last week the committee listened to a report on Sudan's human rights situation
and asserted that Khartoum's efforts to establish human rights is still
severely lacking and does not live up to the required standards.
According to reliable sources that spoke to Sudan Tribune], the Undersecretary
of the Sudanese Ministry of Justice Ismail Abdel-Kader strongly rejected the
report and listed what he said were difficult and challenging circumstances
facing his country while stressing Khartoum's commitment to international laws
and conventions.
Abdel-Kader noted that Islamic Sharia'a law is the source of legislation in
Sudan and addressed what he described as misconception surrounding the death
penalty and that Islamic law contradicts international conventions.
The official said that Sudan like the rest of the world has its own assessments
and mechanisms that allows the implementation of the death penalty for apostasy
in accordance with Islamic Sharia'a law. He went on to say that the death
penalty remains controversial when it comes to defining serious crimes and that
each state decides it in the way it sees appropriate.
Mrs. Ibrahim was sentenced to death in May for renouncing Islam, but was
released last month after what the government said was "unprecedented"
international pressure. An appeals court found her not guilty on 2 charges of
apostasy and adultery and overturned the lower tribunal's verdict.
She is now reportedly facing forgery charges along with police complaints filed
by her alleged siblings. It is not clear what the next legal steps would
entail. Ibrahim and her family are currently staying at the US embassy .
Abdel-Kader pointed out that the Sudanese judiciary annulled 10 death sentences
out of 227 cases explaining that their legal system guarantees right to appeal
capital punishment in the event of sufficient grounds.
A report by Khartoum and another by the UN Independent Expert on the situation
of human rights in Sudan Mashood Baderin will be submitted to the UNHRC plenary
session next September.
(source: Sudan Tribune)
ETHIOPIA:
Ethiopia president defends opposition leader's arrest -- Andargachew Tsege, who
is also a UK national, was sentenced to death in absetia back in 2009 while in
exile for allegedly plotting a coup against the Ethiopian government with his
banned Ginbot 7 movement.
Ethiopian leader Hailemariam Desalegn has defended the arrest of opposition
leader Andargachew Tsege who was extradited from Yemen last month, calling it a
'moral obligation'.
"Andargachew Tsege is a Trojan horse for the Eritrean government to destabilise
this country," he told the BBC.
Tsege, who is also a UK national, was sentenced to death in absetia back in
2009 while in exile for allegedly plotting a coup against the Ethiopian
government with his banned Ginbot 7 movement.
"His stooges were there, who were sent to destabilise and bomb this country -
they were captured red-handed with their bombs and their detonating elements,"
President Desalegn told the BBC's Focus on Africa.
Saying he was not sure if the death penalty would be carried out now that
Andargachew was in custody, he added "If you ask me to tolerate in the name of
democracy those who are engaging [in] destabilising the country and acting as a
terrorist and using guns to change government, then you are wrong."
"If you have any connection with terrorists don't think that the Ethiopian
government will let you [go] free," he said.
Ginbot 7 (15 May) was named after the date of the 2005 elections, which were
marred by protests over alleged fraud that led to the deaths of about 200
people.
Tsege, 2nd-in-command of Ginbot 7 opposition movement, was arrested last month
at Sanaa international airport while on his way to Eritrea.
(source: World Bulletin)
NIGERIA:
Emmanuel Ifeajuna: Commonwealth Games gold to facing a firing squad----The
Nigerian high jumper was the 1st black African to win a gold medal but his
remarkable story had a tragic end
The 1st time Emmanuel Ifeajuna appeared before a crowd of thousands he did
something no black African had ever done. He won a gold medal at an
international sporting event. "Nigeria Creates World Sensation," ran the
headline in the West African Pilot after Ifeajuna's record-breaking victory in
the high jump at the 1954 Empire and Commonwealth Games in Vancouver. He was
the pride not just of Nigeria but of a whole continent. An editorial asked:
"Who among our people did not weep for sheer joy when Nigeria came uppermost,
beating all whites and blacks together?"
In the words of a former schoolmate, Ifeajuna had leaped "to the very pinnacle
of Nigerian sporting achievement". His 9 track and field team-mates won another
6 silver and bronze medals, prompting a special correspondent to write "Rejoice
with me, oh ye sports lovers of Nigeria, for the remarkable achievements of our
boys".
Ifeajuna, feted wherever he went, would soon see his picture on the front of
school exercise books. He was a great national hero who would remain Nigeria's
only gold medallist, in Commonwealth or Olympic sport, until 1966.
The next time Ifeajuna appeared before a crowd of thousands he was bare-chested
and tied to a stake, facing execution before a seething mob. He had co-led a
military coup in January 1966 in which, according to an official but disputed
police report, he shot and killed Nigeria's 1st prime minister. The coup failed
but Ifeajuna escaped to safety in Ghana, dressed as a woman and was driven to
freedom by a famous poet. 20 months later, he was back, fighting for the
persecuted Igbo people of eastern Nigeria in a brutal civil war that broke out
as a consequence of the coup.
Ifeajuna and three fellow officers were accused by their own leader, General
Emeka Ojukwu, of plotting against him and the breakaway Republic of Biafra.
They denied charges of treason: they were trying to save lives and their
country, they said, by negotiating an early ceasefire with the federal
government and reuniting Nigeria. They failed, they died and, in the next 2 1/2
years, so did more than a million Igbos.
The day of the execution was 25 September, 1967, and the time 1.30pm. There was
a very short gap between trial and execution, not least because federal troops
were closing in on Enugu, the Biafran capital, giving rise to fears that the
"guilty 4" might be rescued.
As the execution approached, the 4 men - Ifeajuna, Victor Banjo, Phillip Alale
and Sam Agbam - were tied to stakes. Ifeajuna, with his head on his chest as
though he was already dead, kept mumbling that his death would not stop what he
had feared most, that federal troops would enter Enugu, and the only way to
stop this was for those about to kill him to ask for a ceasefire.
A body of soldiers drew up with their automatic rifles at the ready. On the
order of their officer, they levelled their guns at the bared chests of the 4
men. As a hysterical mass behind the firing squad shouted: "Shoot them! Shoot
them!" a grim-looking officer gave the command: "Fire!" The deafening volley
was followed by lolling heads. Ifeajuna slumped. Nigeria's great sporting hero
died a villain's death. But he had been right. By 4pm 2 1/2 hours after the
executions, the gunners of the federal troops had started to hit their targets
in Enugu with great accuracy. The Biafrans began to flee and the city fell a
few days later.
Of all the many hundreds of gold medallists at the Empire and Commonwealth
Games since 1930 none left such a mark on history, led such a remarkable life
or suffered such a shocking death as Ifeajuna.
His co-plotter in the 1966 coup, Chukwuma Nzeogwu, was buried with full
military honours and had a statue erected in his memory in his home town. But
for Ifeajuna, the hateful verdict of that seething mob carried weight down the
years. His name was reviled, his sporting glory all but written out of
Nigeria's history. His name is absent from the website of the Athletics
Federation of Nigeria, appearing neither in the history of the Federation nor
in any other section. There is no easy road to redemption for the gold
medallist who inadvertently started a war and was shot for trying to stop it.
Nigeria's 1st foray into overseas sport was in 1948, when they sent athletes to
London to compete in the Amateur Athletic Association Championships, and to
watch the Olympic Games before a planned 1st entry in the next Olympiad. In
1950 there was cause to celebrate when the high jumper, Josiah Majekodunmi, won
a silver medal at the Auckland Commonwealth Games. He also fared best of
Nigeria's Olympic pathfinders, the 9-man team who competed at Helsinki in 1952.
Majekodunmi was ninth, with 2 of his team-mates also in the top 20. Nigerians
clearly excelled at the high jump.
With 3 men having competed in that 1952 Olympic final, the Nigeria selectors
had plenty of names to consider for the Commonwealth Games high jump in
Vancouver 2 years later. Ifeajuna, aged 20, was not a contender until he
surprised everybody at the national championships in late April, less than 2
months before the team were due to depart. His jump of 6ft 5.5in, the best of
the season, took him straight in alongside Nafiu Osagie, 1 of the 1952
Olympians, and he was selected.
The high jump was on day one of competition in Vancouver and Ifeajuna wore only
one shoe, on his left foot. One correspondent wrote: "The Nigerian made his
cat-like approach from the left-hand side. In his take-off stride his leading
leg was flexed to an angle quite beyond anything ever seen but he retrieved
position with a fantastic spring and soared upwards as if plucked by some
external agency."
Ifeajuna brushed the bar at 6ft 7in but it stayed on; he then cleared 6ft 8in
to set a Games and British Empire record, and to become the 1st man ever to
jump 13.5in more than his own height. This 1st gold for black Africa was a
world-class performance. His 6ft 8in - just over 2.03m - would have been good
enough for a silver medal at the Helsinki Olympics 2 years earlier.
The team arrived back home on 8 September. That afternoon they were driven on
an open-backed lorry through the streets of Lagos, with the police band on
board, to a civic reception at the racecourse. The flags and bunting were out
in abundance, as were the crowds in the middle and, for those who could afford
tickets, the grandstand. There was a celebration dance at 9pm. Ifeajuna told
reporters he had been so tired, having spent nearly 4 hours in competition,
that: "At the time I attempted the record jump I did not think I had enough
strength to achieve the success which was mine. I was very happy when I went
over the bar on my 2nd attempt."
After a couple of weeks at home Ifeajuna was off to university on the other
side of the country at Ibadan. His sporting career was already over, apart from
rare appearances in inter-varsity matches. He met his future wife, Rose, in
1955. They married in 1959 and had 2 sons. After graduating in zoology he
taught for a while before joining the army in 1960 and was trained in England,
at Aldershot. Ifeajuna had first shown an interest in the military in 1956
when, during a summer holiday in Abeokuta, he had visited the local barracks
with a friend who later became one of the most important figures in the
Commonwealth.
Chief Emeka Anyaoku joined the Commonwealth Secretariat in 1966, the year of
Ifeajuna's coup attempt. While his good friend escaped, returned, fought in the
war and died in front of the firing squad, Anyaoku moved to London, where he
rose to the highest office in the Commonwealth, secretary-general, in 1990. For
4 years at university he lived in a room next door to Ifeajuna, who became a
close friend.
Why did the record-breaking champion stop competing? "From October, 1954, when
he enrolled at Ibadan, he never trained," said Anyaoku, nearly 60 years later.
"He never had a coach - only his games master at grammar school - and there
were no facilities at the university. He simply stopped. He seemed content with
celebrating his gold medal. I don't think the Olympics ever tempted him. I used
to tease him that he was the most natural hero in sport. He did no special
training. He was so gifted, he just did it all himself. Jumping barefoot, or
with one shoe, was not unusual where we came from."
Another hugely influential voice from Nigerian history pointed out that
Ifeajuna, in his days as a student, had "a fairly good record of rebellion".
Olusegun Obasanjo served as head of a military regime and as an elected
president. He recalled Ifeajuna's role in a protest that led to the closure of
his grammar school in Onitsha for a term in 1951, when he was 16. Three years
after winning gold, while at university, Ifeajuna made a rousing speech before
leading several hundred students in protest against poor food and conditions.
The former president also held a manuscript written by Ifeajuna in the
aftermath of the coup but never published. It stated: "It was unity we wanted,
not rebellion. We had watched our leaders rape our country. The country was so
diseased that bold reforms were badly needed to settle social, moral, economic
and political questions. We fully realised that to be caught planning, let
alone acting, on our lines, was high treason. And the penalty for high treason
is death."
In 1964 the Lagos boxer Omo Oloja won a light-middleweight bronze in Tokyo,
thereby becoming Nigeria's 1st Olympic medallist. It was a rare moment of
celebration in a grim year that featured a general strike and a rigged
election. Another election the following year was, said the BBC and Reuters
correspondent Frederick Forsyth, seriously rigged - "electoral officers
disappeared, ballot papers vanished from police custody, candidates were
detained, polling agents were murdered". 1 opposing sides both claimed victory,
leading to a complete breakdown of law and order. "Rioting, murder, looting,
arson and mayhem were rife," said Forsyth. The prime minister, Tafawa Balewa,
refused to declare a state of emergency. There was corruption in the army, too,
with favouritism for northern recruits. A group of officers began to talk about
a coup after they were told by their brigadier that they would be required to
pledge allegiance to the prime minister, from the north, rather than the
country's 1st president, an Igbo. Ifeajuna's group feared a jihad against the
mainly Christian south, led by the north's Muslim figurehead, the Sardauna of
Sokoto.
The coup, codenamed Leopard, was planned in secret meetings. Major Ifeajuna led
a small group in Lagos, whose main targets were the prime minister, the army's
commander-in-chief, and a brigadier, who was Ifeajuna's 1st victim. According
to the official police report, part of which has never been made public,
Ifeajuna and a few of his men broke into the prime minister's home, kicked down
his bedroom door and led out Balewa in his white robe. They allowed him to say
his prayers and drove him away in Ifeajuna's car. On the road to Abeokuta they
stopped, Ifeajuna ordered the prime minister out of the car, shot him, and left
his body in the bush. Others say the Prime Minister was not shot, nor was the
intention ever to kill him: Balewa died of an asthma attack or a heart attack
brought on by fear. There has never been conclusive evidence either way.
Ifeajuna drove on to Enugu, where it became apparent that the coup had failed,
mainly because one of the key officers in Ifeajuna's Lagos operation had
"turned traitor" and had failed to arrive as planned with armoured cars.
Major-General Ironsi, the main military target, was still at large and he soon
took control of the military government. Ifeajuna was now a wanted man. He hid
in a chemist's shop, disguised himself as a woman, and was driven over the
border by his friend Christopher Okigbo, a poet of great renown. Then he
travelled on to Ghana, where he was welcomed.
Ifeajuna eventually agreed to return to Lagos, where he was held pending trial.
Ojukwu, by now a senior officer, ensured his safety by having him transferred,
in April, to a jail in the east. Igbos who lived in the north of the country
were attacked. In weeks of violent bloodshed tens of thousands died. As the
death toll increased, the outcome was civil war. In May, 1967, Ojukwu, military
governor of the south-east of Nigeria, declared that the region had now become
the Republic of Biafra. By the time the fighting ended in early 1970, the
number of deaths would be in the millions.
Arguably, if either of Ifeajuna's plots had been a success, those lives would
not have been lost. The verdicts on his role in Nigerian history are many and
varied: his detractors have held sway. Chief among them was Bernard Odogwu,
Biafra's head of intelligence, who branded Ifeajuna a traitor and blamed him
for "failure and atrocities" in the 1966 coup. Adewale Ademoyega, one of the
1966 plotters, held a different view of Ifeajuna. "He was a rather complicated
character ... intensely political and revolutionary ... very influential among
those close to him ... generous and willing to sacrifice anything for the
revolution."
The last time Anyaoku saw Ifeajuna was in 1963, in Lagos, before Anyaoku's
departure for a diplomatic role in New York. He later moved to London and was
there in 1967. "I was devastated when I heard the news of the execution," he
said. As for Ifeajuna being all but written out of Nigeria's sporting history,
he noted that: "The history of the civil war still evokes a 2-sided argument.
He is a hero to many people, though they would more readily talk about his gold
medal than his involvement in the war. There are people who think he was
unjustifiably executed and others who believe the opposite."
One commentator suggested recently that the new national stadium in Abuja, the
Nigerian capital, should be named after Ifeajuna. It will surely never happen.
(source: Brian Oliver is a former sports editor of the Observer. This is an
edited extract from his book, The Commonwealth Games: Extraordinary Stories
Behind The Medals, published by Bloomsbury and priced 12.99 pounds; The
Guardian)
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