The Nation Newspaper

Tag: freedom

  • Southern Cameroon needs freedom

    Sir: ‘True peace is not the mere absence of tension but the presence of justice’ – Martin Luther King Jr.

    It’s regrettable that the African Union and the regional bloc, the Economic Community of Central African States have turned a blind eye, by neglecting the plight of the people of Southern Cameroons because of the false impression that Cameroon is in peace!

    Behind the seeming peace in Cameroon is a growing Anglophone problem; discrimination, marginalization and almost outright enslavement. Unfortunately, such problems only come to limelight when there are strikes, riots and killings.

    For months schools are shut down, schoolchildren are at home, hospitals are closed and lawyers have also joined the strike action to protests bad governance, arrests, misrule, crackdown on opposition members and the deliberate disruption of the internet service.

    As I write, some activists have been arrested and are facing charges: Barrister Felix Nkongo, Dr. Neba Fontem and radio talk host Mancho Bibixy.

    The BBC world service recently reported on the ongoing strike in the Southern Cameroon. I listened to an interview with a school child expressing optimism and hope in his ambition to become a Medical Doctor after graduation but was at home instead of being in the school, while his peers in Yaoundé as well as Francophone regions were in school.

    Bareta News confirms that the General Certificate of Education Examinations GCE, commenced Monday, May 15 and it was boycotted. It should be recalled that the Southern Cameroons socio-political activists had called on parents, teachers, educational institutions and the general public to boycott the examinations cognisant of the fact that children have not been in school for more than seven months. How can they write and pass exam they are never prepared for? What a shame!

    The government has never been under this type of pressure since independence and this has led to the demand for self-rule or agitation for the office of a Prime Minister in the Southern Cameroon and the authorities in Yaoundé are insisting that Cameroon is one and indivisible.

    The people of Southern Cameroon are asking for good governance, equal opportunity, justice and fairness; it’s only when they are treated like other citizens and enjoy equal distribution of resources that the agitation will stop!

    Paul Biya should act now!

     

    • Abdullateef Tanko A.
    • Abuja.
  • Toke Makinwa savours freedom

    Toke Makinwa savours freedom

    After what seemed like several months of suffocation in a dead marriage, on-air personality Toke Makinwa is ready to breathe the fresh air of freedom once again. Having filed for divorce against her estranged husband Maje Ayida in June last year at the Lagos State High Court, she was in court this week as the divorce proceedings finally began.

    During the brief hearing, her husband, through his lawyer, indicated that he was ready to quit the marriage and move on with his life. However, the court adjourned the case. Still, it was clear that Toke is practically a free woman now and the relief was palpable on her face as she took pictures with her wide-eyed fans during the session.

    It will be recalled that Toke and Maje were involved in a  clash in the second half of last year as the baby-faced beauty revealed in her book, On Becoming, how she was allegedly maltreated in all the years she was married to Maje.

  • Ex-councillor regains freedom

    A community leader in Ikaram-Akoko, Ondo State, Chief Ojo Omotayo (aka Oluomo), who was kidnapped last Saturday, has regained freedom.
    Omotayo, a former councillor in Akoko Northwest Local Government, who represented Erusu/Ikaram Ward, was abducted on Akunu-Ikakumo Road while on a tour.
    The Akala of Ikaram, Oba Andrew Momodu, who broke the news in his palace, hailed the media, security agents and Ikaram comunity for their support in ensuring the victim’s freedom.

  • Press freedom in the age of social media

    Nigeria is a signatory to the Article 19 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) of 1948 and the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).  The two bodies’ declaration states that: “Everyone shall have the right to hold opinions without interference; ii. Everyone shall have the right to freedom of expression; this right shall include freedom to seek, receive and impart information and ideas of all kinds, regardless of frontiers, either orally, in writing or in print, in the form of art, or through any other media of his choice.”

    However, as noble and commendable as this provision is, it is important that social media must be used within the ambit of the law. No doubt, some have used the online media to the extreme by violating people’s rights in one way or the other. This is the reason why professional media organizations and other relevant groups must rise to the occasion by ensuring that the sanctity of the media profession and information sharing process is maintained and honoured by all and sundry.

    It is possible to use the social media platforms to create social disorder with false and insensitive posts. It is necessary that these tools are ethically and rightly used. It is unfortunate that some of online, citizen journalists and out rightly mischievous persons have assumed the levity to disseminate information with impunity without giving consideration to the authenticity of the information or the consequences of their actions. While Article II of the French Declaration states categorically that:”The free communication of ideas and opinions is one of the most precious of the rights of man. Every citizen may, accordingly, speak, write, and print with freedom” it goes on to warn that citizens “shall be responsible for such abuses of the freedom as shall be defined by law.”

    Alfred Denning, L J, an English lawyer and judge, puts it this way: “Freedom of expression is not freedom of the press or users of the social media to destroy other fundamental rights of individuals like the right to family life and privacy or the national interest of the nation at large. Whilst the press and the users of the social media go about expressing themselves freely, they must be cautious and exercise great restraint not to abuse or violate the rights of other citizens or the laws of the land.”

    Some of the tremendous positive impacts of social media in recent times are that of the #OccupyNigeria in late 2011 and 2012 over the fuel subsidy scandal and the recent #BringBackourGirls (#BBOG) campaign, even the former First Lady of the U.S, Mitchell Obama, played a tremendous support in the campaign. Likewise, the platform was used for raising funds for expensive medical bills via the #SaveCitizen initiatives in 2013. So, various social media platforms were used to educate enlighten and galvanise support in the immediate past 2015 General Election. So, it is undisputable that the online media has somehow impacted positively on the social life and democratised access to information.

    As much as no undue steps should be taken to limit the use of the social media and other media outlets, users should be aware that they will be made to face requisite laws when they misuse the platforms.

    Some of our domestic laws and clauses in the Constitution that put certain restraints on the press freedom should be reviewed with a view to harmonising all the provisions that relate to freedom of expression and a free-press society. Concern bodies and agencies should organise periodical workshop, seminars and symposiums that would enhance the efficiency and transparency of the social media platforms.

    Excerpts from a paper presented on Online Press Freedom in the age of Social Media at a summit on Enhancing Press Freedom organised by Centre for Constitutional Governance.

  • Uju Murphy savours freedom

    Like a caged bird set free and which immediately spreads its rusty wings and flies to the skies to savour the sweet air of freedom, Uju Murphy has been a woman reborn in recent times. She is making giant strides in business and putting to shame those who had gone to town to spread the rumour of her ouster from the roll call of happening babes.

    The light-complexioned woman has been making waves since her crashed marriage left her with her business and political career as her main concerns. Not too long ago, she bagged a doctoral degree from Great Achievers University College, Spain. Added to this is the fact that her boutique, Zarazit Collezone, is doing so well with branches now in many parts of the country. She was also the vice-presidential candidate of a political party during the 2015 elections.

    All this made it to look like another lifetime since the dirt sheets feasted on the news of the breakup of her union with Murphy Uzohue on grounds of ‘irreconcilable differences’, even though they had three grown up children together. While the pretty lady has put all that behind her, she certainly is not in the mood to entertain any romantic entreaties for now.

  • Egypt’s Mubarak set free

    Egypt’s Mubarak set free

    Egypt’s former President Hosni Mubarak returned home, Friday, a freeman following his release from custody.

    Mubarak who had been in detention since his ouster in 2011 was slammed with corruption and murder charges.

    He left the Armed Forces hospital in Cairo’s southern suburb of Maadi earlier in the morning. From there, he went to his house in the upscale district of Heliopolis under heavy security measures.

    Mubarak’s lawyer, Farid el-Deeb, told the Egyptian daily Al-Masry al-Youm that the ailing former president returned home with his two sons, Alaa and Gamal, and that the entire family, including Mubarak’s wife Suzanne came together at his house to celebrate his return and have breakfast together.

    The 88-year-old Mubarak was acquitted by Egypt’s top appeals court on March 2 of charges that he ordered the killing of protesters during the 2011 popular uprising that led to his ouster.

    At that point, he had already served a three-year sentence for embezzling state funds while in detention in connection with the case on the deaths of protesters. A criminal court had ruled in May 2015 to jail Mubarak for three years and fine him millions of Egyptian pounds following his conviction for embezzling funds earmarked for the maintenance and renovation of presidential palaces. The ruling was upheld by another court in January 2016.

    Prosecutors, however, reopened another corruption case on Thursday, linked to allegations that Mubarak received gifts from the state-run Al-Ahram newspaper worth $1 million, along with his family members. The case was closed before the prosecutors appealed and the case restarted.

    The order to release Mubarak was the latest in a series of court rulings in recent years in Egypt that acquitted some two dozen, Mubarak-era cabinet ministers, top police officers and aides charged with graft or in connection with the killing of some 900 protesters during the uprising.

    Some of those acquitted have made a comeback in public life, while others partially paid back fortunes they illegally amassed and subsequently faced trial since his ouster in 2011 after legal proceedings that took years since his 2011 ouster — years during which the country witnessed major upheavals and rights activists saw their hopes scuttled that the autocrat would face justice for the deaths of hundreds who defied his rule.

    Activists are of the view that  Mubarak’s acquittal of killing protesters confirms  long-held suspicions that his trial — and that of scores of policemen who faced trial on the same charge — would never bring the justice they demanded.

    It has also, according to activists and Egypt’s beleaguered rights campaigners, confirmed widely-held suspicions that their “revolution” — as the uprising against Mubarak was dubbed — had effectively been reversed by the government of President Abdel-Fattah el-Sissi, a general-turned-politician, in order to restore the status quo in a country ruled undemocratically by men of military background for most of the past 60-plus years.

    Powerful media figures loyal to el-Sissi have relentlessly vilified the 2011 uprising as a conspiracy and demonized its icons as foreign agents who pose a threat to the country’s national security. The fallen protesters, contend some of them, were shot by members of the now-banned Islamist group, the Muslim Brotherhood.

    The attacks began soon after el-Sissi, as army chief, led the 2013 ouster of the Brotherhood’s Mohammed Morsi, after Mubarak Egypt’s first freely elected leader whose one-year in office proved divisive.

    Mubarak’s sons were also convicted and sentenced to three years in prison in the same embezzlement case. They still face charges in an insider trading case, but both are free and have recently made a series of intensely publicized appearances greeted enthusiastically by hardcore supporters of their father

     

  • Man steals N9m truck to sponsor ‘freedom’

    A member of a robbery gang arrested by the Anti- Kidnapping Unit of the Police Zone 2 Command, Lagos, for allegedly stealing a truck along the Lagos-Ibadan expressway, Tunde Suleiman has said he committed the crime in order to sponsor his freedom (graduation) from his furniture training centre. Sulaiman,23, who was paraded among other suspects at the Zone 2 headquarters, Onikan, said the lack of help from relatives after completing his training led him to join a robbery gang. The truck valued at N9,000,000 was reportedly taken by the robbers to Jos, Plateau state for disposal before the police intercepted them. He said: “I stole the truck and gave it to someone to take it to Kano.

    This is my first time of stealing. I did it because there was no one to assist me after my mother died. I learnt furniture making and my boss asked me to do freedom but there was no one to help. We sold the truck for 1million.” Suleiman was arrested along his colleagues Samson Sebastian, Ayo Benjamin, Zakari Yakashe and Yusuff Abdulahi. Yakashe, an automobile dealer in Kano had bought the truck for N1million and contacted Abdulahi who planned to buy it for N2.2million before their arrest. The 36 -year- old said automobile dealer said: “They said it was Customs that seized it and he (the suspect) is working with the Customs. So when we saw it we decided to buy it. So, I connected one of my brothers to buy it. He bought it for N2.2 million.

    Later, they came to meet me in Kano that it was stolen. I have been buying stolen vehicles before.” The zonal intervention squad also nabbed some suspected trans-border robbers. The robbers, Shile Adigun and Ume Victor from Benin Republic had planned to attack a boutique in the Sango Ota area of Ogun State. Items such as a locally made pistol with 17 rounds of live ammunition, single barrelled shot gun, three Toyota Camry cars, and one Infinity Sports Utility Vehicle (SUV) were recovered from the robbers. Shile ,45, said he had spent five years in jail in Benin Republic before embarking on another criminal mission in Nigeria.

    “My friend was the one who gave me two locally made guns to bring it to Muri in Lagos. I didn’t know he was working with the police. He asked me to wait for him in order to call the other person with whom we were to carry out the operation. When he returned, he came with some policemen to arrest me. I have been to jail for FIVE years, for a similar offence in Benin Republic.

    The wives I married have left me and one of my two kids had died before I came out from prison.” The Police also retrieved two live cartridges, one axe, ammunition, machetes, cultists’ uniforms among others from robbers on Oregun Link Road. But Assistant Inspector-General, Zone 2, Mr Kayode Aderanti has said the command would deploy various counter- terrorism squads to tourists’ spots within Lagos and Ogun metropolis to secure lives and property. He said efforts were being made to track criminals within the zone urging residents to go about their festivities peacefully.

  • Gbemi Saraki savours freedom

    Gbemi Saraki savours freedom

    Gbemisola Saraki has it all the brains, the name, the connections, and a stunning figure that can turn heads and break hearts. What is more, the sultry daughter of the late strongman of Kwara politics, Olusola Saraki, maintains a stunning figure and inviting curves as she ages. Gbemi is as free as a bird that perches on the top of the tallest tree, unshackled and unencumbered by the demands of political office or amorous advances. She carries herself with the aura of a graceful amazon whose heart is closed to the tunes of love.

    Gbemi, a younger sister of Senate President Bukola Saraki, has been unattached since her marriage to Segun Fowora collapsed under the weight of ‘irreconcilable differences’ many years ago, and she seems not to be in a hurry to reverse the situation. Even though her ex-beau has since moved on and found another lady to give his heart to, Gbemi has so far remained steadfast in her disavowal of any romantic entanglement. The pleas of her numerous suitors have so far been falling on deaf ears.

    At recent events, society watchers have been hoping she would step out with a new man, but she has always disappointed them. Even when she was recently appointed the Pro-Chancellor of the Federal University, Otuoke, Bayelsa State, she stepped out to accept the appointment without any man beside her.

    Those who are close to her insist that she is happy the way she is and will consider settling down only if the right man comes along.

  • Kidnapped Methodist priest regains freedom

    A priest of the Methodist Church Nigeria, who was kidnapped on his farm at Kufi on Olounda-Aba Road, Ibadan, Oyo State capital, last Thursday, has been freed.

    Diocesan Bishop of the Methodist Cathedral, Ibadan, Rev. Amos Ajiboye, said Rev. Biodun Ogunbekun was released on Tuesday but he did not give any further details.

    The Bishop said: “Our priest was released to us on Tuesday. We are grateful to God and all those who made it possible. We shall be making further statement in due time. He is resting after what he had gone through in the hands of his abductors.”

    It was not known if a ransom was paid to secure release of the priest, who is attached to the Akobo-Ojurin parish in Ibadan.

    However, a source who pleaded for anonymity, said the kidnappers demanded N10 million.

    On the day he was kidnapped, Ogunbekun was in the farm with two of his workers.

    The source said as he was leaving, a gunman forced his way in. Four other gunmen appeared and whisked away the priest into the surrounding bush on foot.

    “We were told the kidnappers did not come with any vehicle or motorcycle. They tried to take the man of God away in his truck but they could not for some reason. They whisked him away on foot,” he said.

  • Former Delta Gov Ibori leaves UK prison in December

    Former Delta Gov Ibori leaves UK prison in December

    Former governor of Delta State, James Onanefe Ibori, is due to  become a free man in December, after spending half of his jail term in United Kingdom prisons, according to a report from London.

    Ibori was jailed for money laundering offences by Southwark Crown court in 2012.

    But it is unclear yet whether he will return to Nigeria immediately as legal proceedings concerning the confiscation of his assets worth tens of millions of dollars are yet to be resolved.

    The delay in resolving the issue stems from allegations of police corruption in the Ibori matter and the likelihood of the former governor taking his case to the Court of Appeal.

    His lawyer told the court on Friday that the former governor   would appeal against his conviction on the grounds that British police and lawyers involved in his case were themselves corrupt.

    Ibori, who governed Delta State from 1999 to 2007, is serving a 13-year sentence after pleading guilty in 2012 to 10 counts of fraud and money-laundering.

    While in office, Ibori acquired luxury properties in Britain, the United States, South Africa and Nigeria. He is the most senior Nigerian politician to have been held to account for the corruption that has blighted Africa’s most populous nation.

    His jailing in Britain, where he had laundered millions of pounds and sent his children to an expensive private school, was hailed as a high point in the international fight against graft and an important signal to other corrupt politicians.

    But his lawyer Ivan Krolick told Southwark Crown Court on Friday that Ibori was “95 percent certain” to challenge his conviction in the Court of Appeal based on documents that have only recently been disclosed to the defence by the prosecution.

    At the same hearing, Stephen Kamlish, a lawyer for Ibori associate and convicted money launderer Bhadresh Gohil, said the documents showed there had been widespread police corruption followed by a cover-up that was still going on now.

    The main allegation is that a police officer involved in the Ibori probe took payments for information in 2007 from a firm of private detectives working on Ibori’s behalf. At the time, Ibori had not been arrested and was still in Nigeria, but knew that British police were investigating his finances.

    Kamlish said prosecution lawyers had known there was evidence of police corruption but had failed to disclose it to defence lawyers. Krolick told Reuters on the sidelines of Friday’s court hearing that Ibori did not know about the payments at the time.

    The police have said that the allegation was thoroughly investigated and that no one was arrested or charged, and no misconduct identified. The officer against whom the allegations have been made is still in active service.

    The Crown Prosecution Service (CPS), after a lengthy internal investigation, said in September it was confident that the convictions of Ibori and Gohil remained valid.

    The CPS has said it found “material to support the assertion that a police officer received payment in return for information.” It did not use the word “evidence”, suggesting it did not consider the material in question amounted to proof.

    But the CPS conceded in September that the material should have been disclosed to the defence, and handed over thousands of documents to defence lawyers. Those were the documents that Kamlish and Krolick were referring to in court on Friday.

    Gohil has already filed an appeal against his conviction. Krolick said Ibori was likely to do so once his legal team had finished going through all the newly disclosed documents.

    As is normal under British procedures, Ibori is due to be released in December after serving half his sentence, taking into account pre-trial detention.

    Gohil, a British former lawyer, has already been released after serving half of a 10-year term for his role in laundering Ibori’s millions.