Various political parties, civil organizations, and youth movements including: the Global Civic Movements for change in Ethiopia, Ethiopian Youth Movements, Ginbot 7, EPRP, Eskemetche, OLF, and Timret have issued an eight-point demands to end the tyrant rule of TPLF. The demands are timely and ground-breaking; such as, the toppling of the TPLF/EPDRF Draconian rule and the commencement of an inclusive Provisional Transitional Government. This unprecedented unity of action, since the 2005 Kinjit led election, by diverse opposition groups is not just a bad omen for Meles Zenawi but a true harbinger of his political demise.
Two
historic events are unfolding before our eyes in Africa today. The new president
of Cote d’Ivoire, AlassaneOuattara,
is asking the International Criminal Court (ICC) to conduct an investigation
into gross human rights violations in his country. In a letter to ICC
prosecutor Luis Moreno-Ocampo, Ouattara
wrote: “It appears the Ivorian justice system, at the moment, is not best
placed to consider the most serious crimes committed over the recent months,
and that any attempts to bring to justice those who are most responsible would
risk running into all kinds of difficulties.”
He emphatically urged the
prosecutor to bring the “people who bear the greatest responsibility for the
most serious crimes before the International Criminal Court.”
Hosni
Mubarak, Egypt’s iron-fisted dictator for three decades, and his sons are
expected to stand trial in an Egyptian court for human rights violations. The
Egyptian Attorney General announced that Mubarak & Sons will face charges
of “intentional murder, attempted murder of demonstrators, abuse of power
to intentionally waste public funds and unlawfully profiting from public funds
for themselves and others.”
Bernard Munyagishari, one of the most notorious leaders of
the genocidal Rwandan Interahamwe, was apprehended last
week (along with, in a separate incident, RatkoMladic, the Butcher of Srebrenica (Bosnia)) ofthe Democratic
Republic of Congo after nearly 16 years on the lam. According to a 2005 ICC indictment, Munyagishari “masterminded a virulent hate campaign
against the Tutsis” and trained and distributed weapons to Interahamwe
groups to enable them “more efficiently to attack and kill the Tutsis and Hutu
opponents.”
Omar
al-Bashir of the Sudan remains a fugitive from justice following his ICC indictment
for genocide and crimes against humanity. Bashir is accused of “masterminding
with absolute control” a criminal plan “to destroy in substantial part the Fur, Masalit and Zaghawa ethnic
groups” and causing the deaths of 35,000 people “outright” in the Darfur region
since 2003.
A
number of former Kenyan officials including the deputy prime minister and two
other ministers, the cabinet secretary, police chief and others stand accused of
murder, rape and persecution by the ICC. They are suspected of orchestrating
the post-election violence that resulted in the deaths of some 1,500 Kenyans
and displacement of over 600,000.
There
is no question that Moammar Gadhafi & Sons will
soon be indicted by the ICC for crimes against humanity and war crimes in
connection with the massive atrocities that are taking place in Libya today. In
his ICC application for an arrest warrant, Prosecutor Moreno-Ocampos argued: “The evidence shows that Moammar Gadhafi personally ordered attacks on unarmed
Libyan civilians. His forces attacked Libyan civilians in their homes and in
the public space, shot demonstrators with live ammunition, used heavy weaponry
against participants in funeral processions and placed snipers to kill those
leaving mosques after prayers.”
The
trial of the ruthless Liberian warlord Charles Taylor before the ICC on charges
of crimes against humanity and war crimes recently concluded in The Hague after
three and one-half years of litigation. A verdict is expected in the
foreseeable future.
Africa’s
dictators who once sneered at the very notion of legal accountability for their flagrant human
rights abuses are now waking up at night in cold sweat. They keep interrogating
themselves in the middle of the night: First it was Bashir. Now it is Mubarak.
Next is Gadhafi and after him… Ben Ali, Ali Saleh and
then…?
Lady
Justice “is like a train that is nearly always late”, but she has finally
arrived at her African destination with a scale in one hand and a sword in the
other, and without her blindfold to see the atrocities that continue to be committed
by Africa’s thugtators. A new dawn is rising
over the darkness of dictatorship that envelopes Africa.
Could
the election of AlassaneOuattara
signal the beginning of Africa’s second independence? Is
there hope for the end of thugtatorship in Africa and the beginning of a new era of democratic
governance, openness and political accountability?
Ouattara’s letter to Moreno-Ocampo is in itself an extraordinary act of leadership,
courage, audacity and supreme self-confidence. It is a monumental event in
Africa’s modern political history. No African leader has ever asked or invited
the ICC to investigate human rights abuses and prosecute the violators. In fact,
in August 2010, the African Union (AU) thumbed its nose at the ICC stating: “The
AU Member States shall not cooperate pursuant to the provisions of Article 98
of the Rome Statute of the ICC relating to immunities, for the arrest and
surrender of President Omar El Bashir of the Sudan”. In other words, Africa’s
leaders will shelter the Butcher of Darfur from facing justice.
Against
the backdrop of the AU denunciation, Ouattra’s invitation
for an ICC investigation is refreshing and reassuring. Manifestly, Ouattra is aware of the fact that an ICC investigation is a
double-edged sword that could cut him and his supporters just as easily as Gbagbo and his crew. To be sure, there are serious
allegations of human rights abuses by Ouattara’s
current prime minister, Guillaume Soro. An ICC investigation could potentially
implicate Ouattara himself, possibly casting a long
dark shadow over the remainder of his presidency. Regardless, Ouattara says full speed ahead, damn the torpedoes. Let the
chips fall where they may!
Why
is Ouattra doing this? Does he have something up his
sleeve? I am still reeling from the fact that an African leader is actually upholding
human rights instead of trashing them, calling for an independent investigation
instead of putting out a whitewash. Could it be that Ouattara
is a truly new breed of African leader? Is
it possible that he genuinely believes in the rule of law, human rights and full
legal accountability? Maybe he wants to end the culture of impunity in his
country and set a shining example of a new culture of respect for human rights for
the continent. Just maybe Ouattra’s leadership role
model is Nelson Mandela.
On
May 21, the day of Ouattara’s formal inauguration,
the ICC Prosecutor lodged an application with the ICC to investigate “crimes within
the jurisdiction of the Court that have been committed in the Ivory Coast since
28 November 2010.”
Nature
of Human Rights Violations in the Cote d’Ivoire
The
human rights violations alleged in Cote d’Ivoire are of the most egregious
types. According to a January 2011 Human Rights
Watch Report, security forces and militia under the control of
Laurent Gbagbo have allegedly committed extrajudicial
killings, forced disappearances, torture, and rape.Gbagbo’s supporters
are accused of undertaking an “organized campaign of violence targeting members
of opposition political parties, ethnic groups from northern Côte d’Ivoire,
Muslims, and immigrants from neighboring West African countries.” Seven women supporters
of Ouattara engaged in peaceful demonstration were gunned
down before the cameras by Gbagbo’s forces in
February 2011.
According
to an April
2011 Human Rights Watch Report, “forces loyal to President-elect AlassaneOuattara killed hundreds
of civilians, raped more than 20 alleged supporters of his rival, Laurent Gbagbo, and burned at least 10 villages in Côte d’Ivoire’s
far western region.” The report alleged “in one particularly horrific incident,
hundreds of ethnic Guéré civilians perceived as
supporting Gbagbo were massacred in the western town
of Duékoué by a mixture of pro-Ouattara
groups.” Credible reports by charity groups who visited the location put the
number at over one thousand.
The
Ivorian human rights violators will likely face war crimes and crimes against
humanity charges similar to those lodged against the former
Liberian warlord Charles Taylor. For
purposes of war crimes (Convention III, Article 3 Geneva Convention (1949) and
of Additional Protocol II), charges will likely include unlawful killings,
terrorizing the civilian population, physical violence, sexual violence,
abductions and pillage, among others. Other particularized charges may include ill-treatment
or deportation of civilian residents, the killing of prisoners and wanton
destruction of cities, towns and villages. Charges of crimes against humanity (Article
7, Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court) will likely include murder,
rape, abductions, political or religious persecution and other inhumane acts
and practice of atrocities tolerated or condoned by a government or a de facto
authority. There is substantial evidence to show the occurrence of widespread and
systematic practices of atrocity by both sides of the Ivorian conflict in the
post-election period to justify vigorous prosecutions.
No
Truth, No Reconciliation. No Justice, No Peace.
What Ouattra has done in Cote d’Ivoire could be the most
significant act in the cause of the freedom, democracy and human rights in Africa’s
modern history. By the stroke of his pen, Ouattra has
the raised the bar for legal accountability and may have begun a new era and
tradition of the rule of law in the continent. By letting justice take its
course, Ouattara has taken the first decisive step to
heal the wounds and divisions of Ivorian society.
There
are many lessons to be learned from Ouattara’s heroic
act. First, without revealing the truth about human rights abuses, there can be
no reconciliation in Cote d’Ivoire or any other society victimized by massive
human rights violations. The South Africans managed to make an effective transition
to democracy and heal a society torn apart by the vile and inhuman ideology of apartheid
in their Truth and Reconciliation Commission (TRC).
Second,
if Africa’s dictators believe they will face justice for their criminal actions
regardless of how long it takes, they will think a hundred times before
ordering massacres of peaceful unarmed demonstrators in the streets, jailing of thousands of innocent people and
indiscriminate bombing of civilians.
Third, legal accountability under international human rights standards means
Africa’s dictators will have no place to run to or hide and enjoy their
billions in stolen loot. The world will be their prison.
When
the rule of law is deep-rooted in Africa, the tables will finally turn. The
people will no longer fear their leaders and governments. Rather, the leaders
and government institutions will fear the people. That will mark Africa’s long
overdue transition from thugtatorship (“the highest
stage of African dictatorship”) to democracy.
Dr.
Martin Luther King, Jr. said: “We shall overcome because the arc of the moral
universe is long, but it bends towards justice.” Justice has yet to arrive for
193 unarmed Ethiopian protesters massacred in the streets in 2005 and 763 shot
and wounded. These victims are not some nameless individuals buried in shallow
graves. Their identities are well known to all and shall never be
forgotten. The identities
of the 237 policemen who committed the massacre are also well known. There is overwhelming evidence of gross human
rights abuses in Gambella in western Ethiopia and in the Ogaden region in the east as well as many other parts
of the country. There are thousands of political
prisoners languishing in secret prisons in Ethiopia today.
The
monstrous crimes committed against these victims will not remain forever shrouded
in the fog of history because the arc of the moral universe is long and it
bends towards justice. That is why I believe justice delayed in Ethiopia is NOT
justice denied. Paraphrasing the great African American poet Langston Hughes, justice
delayed in Ethiopia is a “sore that festers and runs, and sags” like a heavy
load ready to explode.
Keep Hope Alive in
Ethiopia!
Previous commentaries by the author are available at:
www.huffingtonpost.com/alemayehu-g-mariam/ and
http://open.salon.com/blog/almariam/
