WEDNESDAY, 6.00PM:
A DAMNING report cataloguing the Nigerian military junta’s systematic violation of basic human rights was issued by a UN special rapporteur on Wednesday.
The report, the first to be devoted entirely to Nigeria, provoked an angry reaction from Nigeria’s foreign minister Tom Ikimi, who said the European Union, and Britain in particular, wants to destabilise his country by denouncing human rights abuse.
Soli Jehangir Sorbjee, the rapporteur, told the annual session of the United Nations Human Rights Commission in Geneva that dictator General Sani Abacha’s government “regularly suppresses, harasses and detains those who criticise its policies”.
Sorbjee listed a catalogue of abuse of judicial rights, including deaths in detention, death sentences given to children and unjustified and excessively long periods of detention.
Sorbjee, who was refused permission to carry out the study in person by Nigerian authoriries, said that Nigeria had ceased to be governed by the rule of law.
Ikimi retorted that the denunciation of human rights abuses is being used as an “instrument of oppression in the hands of a few powerful nations”.
Ikimi added that the European Union’s 1998 budget, which sets aside funds to support democracy in Nigeria, is being used “to finance subversion throughout the country”.
Meanwhile, Abacha has warned Nigeria’s five political parties against trying to block his so far undeclared candidacy for president, it was reported on Wednesday.
Abacha’s aides have been meeting leaders from the five parties to ensure they choose Abacha as their candidate in presidential elections in August. At least one, the United Congress Party of Nigeria, has said it will support Abacha.
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