AfricaFocus Bulletin
May 5, 2016 (160505)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“After two decades spent fighting in the bush, Dominic Ongwen, a
senior commander in the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA),
faces trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) on seventy
counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. … the first time
that a former child soldier will be prosecuted at the ICC and the
first time that an accused faces charges for the same crimes
perpetrated against him. As such, the Ongwen trial raises myriad
questions and poses difficult dilemmas regarding the prosecution of
child soldiers.” – Justice in Conflict symposium

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The demands of justice, accountability, and healing after any
conflict are all imperative. But satisfying any of these demands,
much less all three, is far from easy, particularly in the case of
child soldiers. The role of the International Criminal Court is
controversial in many ways. But the issues raised in this symposium
would remain difficult, regardless of whether the decisions were being made
by any other international or national court, governmental body, or truth
commission.

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains the introduction and excerpts
from three of the commentaries in an on-line symposium on the
Dominic Ongwen Trial and the Prosecution of Child Soldiers.
Commentaries included are by Ledio Cakaj, Rosebell Kagumire, and
Mark A. Drumbl. Additional commentaries in the symposium are
available at http://tinyurl.com/havs44v

For additional background, analysis, and sources on the Lord’s
Resistance Army and the conflict in Northern Uganda, widely
publicized in the “Kony 2012” on-line campaign, see in particular:
http://www.africafocus.org/docs12/kon1203a.php and
http://www.africafocus.org/docs12/kon1203b.php

For other previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Uganda, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/uganda.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

The Dominic Ongwen Trial and the Prosecution of Child Soldiers – A
Justice in Conflict Symposium

by Mark Kersten

Justice in Conflict, April 11, 2016

http://justiceinconflict.org – Direct URL:
http://tinyurl.com/havs44v

After two decades spent fighting in the bush, Dominic Ongwen, a
senior commander in the notorious Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA),
faces trial at the International Criminal Court (ICC) on seventy
counts of war crimes and crimes against humanity. In early 2015,
Ongwen was surrendered to the ICC via another rebel army, the Séléka
rebel coalition and US forces ‘hunting’ for LRA combatants in the
Central African Republic. To date, Ongwen is the only alleged
perpetrator from northern Uganda to find himself facing judges at
the ICC. Ongwen’s trial is momentous for many reasons. It marks the
first time that a former child soldier will be prosecuted at the ICC
and the first time that an accused faces charges for the same crimes
perpetrated against him. As such, the Ongwen trial raises myriad
questions and poses difficult dilemmas regarding the prosecution of
child soldiers.

To examine these issues, Justice in Conflict is honoured to host an
online symposium on The Dominic Ongwen Trial and the Prosecution of
Child Soldiers. …

Symposium contributions include:

The Life and Times of Dominic Ongwen, Child Soldier and LRA
Commander, by Ledio Cakaj

Rupturing Official Histories in the Trial of Dominic Ongwen, by Adam
Branch

The Ongwen Trial and the Struggle for Justice in Northern Uganda, by
Rosebell Kagumire

What Counts against Ongwen – Effectiveness at the Price of
Efficiency?, by Danya Chaikel

There is Nothing Extraordinary about the Prosecution of Dominic
Ongwen, by Alex Whiting

We Need to Talk About Ongwen: The Plight of Victim-Perpetrators at
the ICC, by Barrie Sander

Shifting Narratives: Ongwen and Lubanga on the Effects of Child
Soldiering, by Mark A. Drumbl

Press Release: Prosecutor of the International Criminal Court Speaks
on the Trial of Dominic Ongwen, by Mark Kersten

**************************************************************

The Life and Times of Dominic Ongwen, Child Soldier and LRA
Commander

by Ledio Cakaj

April 12, 2016

[Ledio Cakaj is a researcher working on conflict in East and Central
Africa. His book, When the Walking Defeats You; One Man’s Journey as
Joseph Kony’s Bodyguard, will be published in November 2016 by Zed
Books.]

It must be strange being in Dominic Ongwen’s shoes. Suited up in a
large room in a foreign country with fancy lawyers and judges
staring him down, accusing him of unspeakable crimes. No wonder he
seems amused, bewildered and confused. The legal proceedings must be
particularly outlandish to a man, who, snatched from his family as a
child, tried to excel at whatever life threw at him, only for life
to change the script over and over again. And it must be
particularly frustrating for him to be compared to Joseph Kony, a
man whose clutches Ongwen has tried to escape for at least the last
decade.

At ten or so, Ongwen excelled at school and was expected to go far,
become a teacher like his parents, a lawyer or a doctor. When
fighters from the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) abducted him in the
early 1990s, he was too small to walk long distances or fight, even
though children already fought in the LRA ranks. It was Ongwen’s
perseverance and his desire to do well and make the adults proud
that saw him not only survive the hostile environment but also
become a noted fighter. Had the country of its birth provided him
with basic security, he might have become a noted lawyer or perhaps
a doctor.

At fifteen Ongwen was exposed to – and allegedly forced to
participate in – the massacre of over 300 people in the village of
Atiak, masterminded by Vincent Otti, Ongwen’s mentor in the LRA.
Under Otti’s guidance, Ongwen had to punish civilians who did not
help the LRA, fight Ugandan soldiers, and abduct more youths to fill
the ranks. Refusal brought beatings and death.

While in the first years of his life as a rebel Ongwen might have
acted under duress, he was taught, and likely convinced, that the
LRA’s struggle was just. Kony addressed assemblies of LRA members in
true Sunday Mass style saying that the LRA fought for the rights of
the Acholi people, who were abused by the Ugandan army. He swore
that the Holy Spirit had forced him to save the Acholi. Kony was
fond of a line from the Old Testament: “If you are led by the
Spirit, you are not under the law.”

Apart from fighting for his people, Ongwen was also told he was
lamony — a soldier. The world that Ongwen-the-soldier inhabited was
different to the one Ongwen-the-child left behind. Being alive was
contingent on killing others. To take their food, clothes, or their
ability to shoot back. Survival chances increased with promotion
into officer ranks as low-level fighters were the first to die from
bullets or pervasive shortages of food. Ongwen obeyed orders, fought
hard, and excelled in the way of the rebels. By his late teens he
was a commander with bodyguards, ‘wives’ and young servants.

Ongwen was good at fighting and killing. But he never was a top
commander, certainly not on par with those who had joined Kony from
the start, like Kenneth Banya, Vincent Otti or Okot Odhiambo. Sadly,
there were many others like Ongwen in the LRA, young men abducted as
children who were eager to please the Lapwony Madit (Big Teacher)
Kony. Many of them like, Ochan Bunia, Vincent ‘Binany,’ or Otim
‘Ferry,’ have died fighting for Kony. Others, like Patrick Agweng or
Jon Bosco Kibwola were killed on Kony’s orders, mostly as sacrifices
to appease his ego. Of the surviving ones, Okot George ‘Odek,’ who
left the LRA in February 2016, told me, he worried he would be
charged by the ‘World Court (a reference to the International
Criminal Court (ICC)),’ like Ongwen. Similarly, Opiyo Sam, another
LRA commander who returned to Uganda two years ago, claimed he does
not know or understand why Ongwen was singled out by the ICC.

Growing older made Ongwen wiser to Kony’s ways, which in turn made
him lose his commander status and its associated benefits handed out
by Kony as he saw fit. Ongwen became openly critical with Kony and
was demoted. In his mid-20s Ongwen seemed interested in leaving the
LRA but he was too scared to do so, feeling trapped. He was
terrified of the bad spirits he had unleashed and worried that they
would haunt him if he left the rebels – and the protection of the
Holy Spirit – to become a civilian once again. He was also concerned
with being thrown in prison or being killed by the Ugandan
authorities – a common fear for many LRA members.

Ongwen tried more than once to find a way out of the LRA, discussing
defection with local clergy, fellow fighters and his ‘wives.’ In
early 2006 as he contemplated surrender once more, Otti called from
Congo’s Garamba Park. The LRA leaders prepared for peace talks -the
Juba Talks – and Kony wanted to show full strength. He wanted all
the fighters to assemble in Congo but openly suspected Ongwen, who
led one of the last remaining small groups in Northern Uganda, of
wanting to quit. Otti said that a new World Court – a reference to
the ICC – wanted to capture and kill Ongwen but that the peace talks
offered a way out. Ongwen agreed, reluctantly leaving Uganda in
August 2006, the last LRA commander to make it to Congo.

As the peace talks stalled, Ongwen became reportedly depressed and
resorted to alcohol, particularly after Kony allowed its consumption
in the spring of 2007. In November 2007 Kony had Otti killed,
effectively ending the peace process and any possibility of making
the ICC arrest warrants go away, as Otti had promised Ongwen.

At the end of 2008, after the Ugandan army launched Operation
Lightning Thunder against LRA bases in Garamba Park, LRA groups
carried out retaliatory attacks against Congolese civilians, leaving
more than a thousand dead in a few weeks. Ongwen was reportedly in
charge of a group that attacked Doruma, killing many as they
celebrated Christmas. Throughout 2009 and until 2014, he operated in
northeastern Congo, often following river Duru into South Sudan
where his troops attacked civilians, mostly to secure food. He
continued to lead his own group, often refusing to liaise with
Kony’s messengers or respond to Kony’s radio messages. Kony remained
suspicious and critical of Ongwen. On three different occasions, he
threatened to have Ongwen killed, including in October 2007 when
Ongwen was the only commander to protest Otti’s execution.

In late 2014, a Kony bodyguard stumbled upon Ongwen’s group -at that
point acting independently of Kony – near the Congo – Central
African Republic (CAR) border. Ongwen was somehow convinced to join
Kony in Kafia Kingi, a Sudanese Army controlled area in Southern
Darfur, where Kony had him tortured and put under house arrest. As
in previous instances, Kony said he did not want to kill him because
his sister, also abducted at a young age, was one of Kony’s favorite
wives. With the help of a fighter who was supposed to guard him,
Ongwen managed to escape before Kony could do much worse.

Ongwen reportedly left the LRA camp barefoot and barely clothed and
walked for days towards the CAR border where he was helped by cattle
keepers, who took him to a Seleka group, near the town of Sam
Ouandja, CAR. Not understanding Ongwen’s importance, the Seleka
commander reached out, via a local merchant and an NGO worker, to
the American Special Forces in Obo, CAR. A US helicopter was
dispatched to transport Ongwen from Sam Ouandja to Obo where he was
later handed over to the Ugandan army. After a few days in Obo at
the Ugandan army base, Ongwen was flown to Bangui and then to The
Hague.

***************************************************************

The Ongwen Trial and the Struggle for Justice in Northern Uganda

by Rosebell Kagumire

April 14, 2016

[Rosebell Kagumire is a Ugandan journalist, communications
specialist, public speaker and award-winning blogger. She has over
10 years experience working at the intersection between media and
rights in crisis, women’s rights, peace and security.] For previous
posts in the symposium, click here.

My first trip to northern Uganda was in 2005. I was working at a
newspaper in Kampala and went on an assignment. The air was still
and tense, our hosts warned us not to stay late at the bar in Gulu
town, the biggest town in the province of Acholiland. I had many
interviews, comprising of countless horror stories from children as
young as five on what they had gone through during the war. They
were still ‘night commuters’ – children would leave their homes in
the rural areas to spend a night in the relative safety of Gulu town
where the army could protect them from being abducted. I was one of
the Ugandans privileged enough not to have any direct experience
with war. My parents weren’t. Post-independence Uganda saw many
turbulences and the struggle for power continued. In the vacuum and
absence of national consolidation, resistance and rebel movements
mushroomed.

The Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) were one of the last rebel
movements to emerge and put up the longest rebellion, well known for
their horrendous tactics and the terrible crimes they committed
against the populations of Northern and North Eastern Uganda. The
children I spoke with on that 2005 trip lived in a totally different
world than me, even though we were from the same country. Besides
the LRA’s violence, they also witnessed other children, as well as
their siblings, parents and relatives either mutilated or die of
preventable disease in internally displaced peoples camps set up by
the Government of Uganda to ‘protect’ them. You didn’t have to know
international criminal law to know these were crimes against
humanity.

One of the teenage boys I interviewed was Simon. Simon had been
recently released after a few months at a rehabilitation centre. But
it wasn’t really rehabilitation, as the sheer volume of children
either rescued or escaped from the LRA was too high for the
available centres to provide adequate psychosocial support.

Simon had passed through one of those centres and so we sat down to
hear his story. As with the heinous acts many children recounted to
me, it was hard not to feel pressure rise in your chest listening to
these stories. Simon was forced to kill his parents with a machete
before he was abducted. The rebels threatened to kill the whole
family if he wouldn’t do it. Forcing Simon to kill his parents began
the process of mutating him into a child soldier. Simon spent many
years with the LRA, during which he knew he couldn’t return. How
could he come back to a community that knew he had killed his own
parents? And what was home? His siblings, his relatives, could he
ever be forgiven? These were questions that Simon couldn’t move
past.

Like many child soldiers, Simon would go on to kill many more people
during his time in the LRA. Finally, after five years in the bush at
the age of 20 he was returned to his surviving relatives in the camp
after a rescue by the Ugandan army in 2005. But the family didn’t
want anything to do with him and, in the absence of proper
government run shelters and psychosocial services, Simon still
battled trauma and nightmares when I visited him again in 2008.

Simon’s life comes to mind when considering the proceedings against
Dominic Ongwen. Ongwen was abducted by the LRA as a child and rose
through the ranks of the rebel group. When he was surrendered to the
ICC in early 2015, my thought was that any of the children I had
interviewed could have become an Ongwen. If they hadn’t been
rescued, some could have gone on with their fear of return replaced
with the power that the gun and rebel hierarchy bring.

We are told that Ongwen’s trial is about justice. But what does that
mean for the local communities who have to heal? This includes those
families whose children were abducted just like Ongwen and families
whose children were abducted by Ongwen. The calls for forgiveness
from some victims are not a surprise. Many know their own children
are still struggling to overcome the trauma and cope with the crimes
they were forced to carry out.

While some believe Ongwen’s trial will go a long way to holding LRA
accountable and bring some form of justice to victims (evidenced by
the more 2,000 victims who have agreed to support the trial), other
victims have called for local justice measures and reconciliation.
This has precedence, they claim, as top former LRA commanders were
granted amnesty by the Government even though they could easily be
charged with hundreds of counts of war crimes themselves. The
commanders live freely in northern Uganda and many argue that, given
that he was abducted, Ongwen, deserves the same pardon.

On the other hand, the ICC trial will be important for both victims
and the country as a means to understand and confront what really
happened in northern Uganda. Ongwen faces 70 counts of war crimes
and crimes against humanity include murder, persecution, torture,
pillaging, conscription of child soldiers, and sexual and gender-
based crimes, which he allegedly committed between 2003 and 2005 in
the internally displaced camps of Lukodi, Pajule, Abok and Odek in
the north. But in Uganda, while many condemn the LRA and the crimes
committed, missing is the role of government which many in the north
would have wanted to see interrogated — and investigated.

For the people of northern Uganda, the charge of forced marriage
will be of particular significance. The Rome Statute doesn’t cover
it as a crime but the prosecutor has charged it as cruel inhuman
treatment. Through the prosecution of forced marriage, the sexual
crimes against many women who were abducted and given as rewards for
men fighting will uniquely bring out the plight of women during this
war. The trial will also have to dig deeper into how one transitions
from victim to perpetrator and how capable one can be, if abducted,
in forming the necessary intent to commit the crimes Ongwen is
charged with. The trial in general will hopefully highlight the
complexity of the 20-plus year war where the lines between victim
and perpetrator are sometimes blurred.

Many also hope that Ongwen’s ICC appearance and his possible trial
will move the Government and other actors to finally tend to the
real needs of the communities on the ground who still have no
reparations programs nor reconciliation and truth-seeking processes.
The communities are still in need psycho-social support and it is
largely wanting. If the proceedings against Ongwen at the ICC can
help increase the chances that the people of northern Uganda receive
the attention and services they deserve, it holds out the
possibility of being a success.

***********************************************************

Shifting Narratives: Ongwen and Lubanga on the Effects of Child
Soldiering

by Mark A. Drumbl

April 20, 2016

[Mark A. Drumbl is the Class of 1975 Alumni Professor of Law &
Director, Transnational Law Institute, Washington & Lee School of
Law.]

On March 23, 2016, ICC Pre-Trial Chamber (PTC) II issued its
decision confirming charges against Dominic Ongwen. PTC II confirmed
many charges, including for sexual and gender-based crimes. Ongwen
will be tried for some crimes that he had himself endured. These
include the war crime of cruel treatment, conscription and use as a
child soldier, and the crime against humanity of enslavement.

Ongwen was abducted into the Lord’s Resistance Army (LRA) at the age
of 9 while walking home from school. He was bullied, brutalized, and
indoctrinated as a child soldier. He rose through the ranks. He
ascended to the upper echelons of power, although these remained
tightly controlled by LRA leader Joseph Kony.

Irrespective of how high he ascended, however, Ongwen’s point of
entry remains fixed as a young, kidnapped, orphaned, and abused
child. Ongwen’s defense team invoked this point of entry in its
submissions. Defense counsel did so to make two specific legal
points. First, that the ongoing and continuous nature of the crime
of child soldiering means that Ongwen left the LRA – nearly thirty
years later – still as a child soldier and, thereby, that he should
be entitled to the evacuation of individual criminal responsibility
that hortatorily inheres in the international legal regime that
protects child soldiers. Second, the defense team submitted that
coming of age in the LRA amounts to a kind of institutionalized
duress that excludes criminal responsibility under Rome Statute
article 31(1)(d) rather than just mitigating sentence. According to
the defense, Ongwen “lived most of his life under duress (i.e. from
the age of 9.5 years old)” and his “so-called rank was demonstrative
of one thing: that he was surviving better than others while under
duress”.

When making both arguments, the Ongwen defense team extensively (yet
unsuccessfully) invoked the findings of Dr. Elisabeth Schauer, a
court-appointed expert whose testimony on the dissociation and
trauma arising out of the child soldiering experience had been
dispositive to the Lubanga case. In Lubanga, child soldiers were the
victims and Lubanga the adult perpetrator; in Ongwen, the accused is
a former child soldier and many of his alleged victims were children
at the time.

PTC II perfunctorily dismissed Ongwen’s first argument without
providing any reasons. PTC II also dismissed the second argument,
although not quite as perfunctorily. One judge, moreover, will
append in due course a separate, concurring opinion.

Reasonable minds can disagree as to whether the defense arguments
have merit. The point of my commentary is not to revisit these
arguments. …

Instead, my point is to emphasize that international criminal law
should proceed in consistent and predictable ways. Here, PTC II
slipped. Its understanding of the agency of actual and former child
soldiers in Ongwen departs from the understanding previously
deployed by the Lubanga Trial and Appeals Chambers, in particular in
the sentencing judgments.

Lubanga cast the linkage between the past as a child soldier and the
present as a former child soldier as linear and continuous. The
child soldiering experience was constructed as ongoing and assured:
it rendered the children as victims damaged for life, with their
reality today as derivative of their previous suffering. Once a
child soldier in fact, always a child soldier in mind, body, and
soul. In Ongwen, however, the linkage between the accused’s past as
a child soldier and his present as a former child soldier was seen
as discontinuous and contingent.

In his opening statement in the Lubanga trial, then Chief Prosecutor
Luis Moreno-Ocampo portrayed the former child soldiers as indelibly
wounded and recurrently traumatized.

“They cannot forget the beatings they suffered; they cannot forget
the terror they felt and the terror they inflicted; they cannot
forget the sounds of their machine guns; they cannot forget that
they killed; they cannot forget that they raped and that they were
raped.”

The 2012 Lubanga sentencing judgment (confirmed on appeal in
December 2014) had prioritized and excerpted from Dr. Schauer’s
expert submissions that the Ongwen defense team sought
unsuccessfully to invoke. Elements of Dr. Schauer’s work pertinent
to the Lubanga sentencing analysis include her submissions that
“children of war and child soldiers […] often suffer from
devastating long-term consequences of experienced or witnesses acts
of violence” and that conflict experiences “can hamper children’s
healthy development and their ability to function fully even once
the violence has ceased.” …

In Ongwen, however, a different narrative emerges. This narrative
contemplates agency, choice, and action. In response to the
defense’s emphasis on Ongwen’s entry into the LRA as an abducted
child, PTC II held that “the circumstances of Ongwen’s stay in the
LRA […] cannot be said to be beyond his control… [.]” PTC II
concluded that “escapes from the LRA were not rare.” It underscored
that Ongwen “could have chosen not to rise in hierarchy and expose
himself to increasingly higher responsibility to implement
policies.” It added that the evidence demonstrates that Dominic
Ongwen “shared the ideology of the LRA, including its brutal and
perverted policy with respect to civilians”. PTC II noted that
Ongwen could “have avoided raping” forced wives, “or, at the very
least, he could have reduced the brutality of the sexual abuse”.

PTC II thereby shied away from the Lubanga narrative of the
pernicious, ongoing effect of being compelled as a child into a
violent armed group and socialized therein. Whereas the defense
sought to link Ongwen’s conduct as an adult to his horrid
experiences as a child, PTC II only examined his agency as an adult
– as if he had never been a child, let alone a child in the LRA. In
rejecting the duress submissions in Ongwen, PTC II elides Ongwen’s
status as a former child soldier. It’s as if he lost that status, or
ceded it. Hence, there is a proper way to be a victim. Victimhood is
contingent, so to speak, even aleatory.

In truth, the Ongwen narrative reflects the diverse experiences of
actual and former child soldiers and the complexities of survival
and social navigation in invidious circumstances. After all,
problematic essentialisms abound in the Lubanga criminal judgments.

That said, in the push to confirm charges against Ongwen, PTC II
invokes language that should perturb child rights activists. The
Ongwen confirmation of charges decision conflicts with a tenet of
post-conflict rehabilitation and reintegration. This tenet
approaches all persons (regardless of age) who had become associated
with armed groups and armed forces while under the age of 18 as
former child soldiers and accords them entitlements and treatment
that hinge upon this status.

The contrast between Ongwen and Lubanga vivifies how narratives of
agency, choice, and constraint may become instrumentalized by judges
to suit the prosecutorial impulse. This contrast additionally
reflects the clumsiness of the criminal law in conceptualizing child
soldiering specifically and, in Ongwen’s case, victim-perpetrator
circularity generally.

*****************************************************

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a
particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please
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http://www.africafocus.org

Nigeria: Shapes of Violence, 2

AfricaFocus Bulletin
April 27, 2016 (160427)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“It has been two years since the world’s deadliest terrorist
organization – Boko Haram – abducted 271 girls from their high
school in the town of Chibok – a tragedy that would shine much
needed international attention on conflict in northeastern Nigeria.
Sadly, the Chibok girls are only one part of a much larger story of
violence against women and girls in the northeast. … the needs of
all those whom the Chibok girls symbolize – thousands upon thousands
who have suffered gender-based violence at Boko Haram’s hands – are
being unaddressed.” – Refugees International

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs16/nig1604b.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
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This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains excerpts from a new report by
Refugees International, documenting the failures of humanitarian
assistance to address gender-based violence in northeastern Nigeria,
both by Boko Haram and among those who have been displaced by the
violence. Also included is an Amnesty International report on an
entirely separate case of violence, in which Nigerian security
forces in December last year perpetrated “mass slaughter of hundreds
of men, women and children …and the attempted cover-up of this
crime,” against followers of a Shiite Muslim group in Zaria in
north-central Nigeria.

As these examples show, the realities of violence, whether in
Nigeria, other African countries, or indeed in rich countries such
as the United States as well, are often far more complicated than
the stereotypes that often prevail among those observing them from a
distance. Thus, violence in Nigeria is often simplistically
characterized as “religious conflict” between Muslims and
Christians. A new collection of empirical studies released this year
by Nigeria Watch, based in Ibadan, Nigeria, provides a more complex
perspective, documenting, for instance, that intra-Muslim conflict
is more common that conflicts between Muslims and Christians, and
that much of the conflict involving both Muslims and Christians is
based on secular rather than religious motives.

Another AfricaFocus Bulletin, available on the web but not sent out
by email, contains excerpts from one of the chapters in this new
report, focused specifically on violence involving Christians and
Muslims in Nigeria. The full 216-page report is available at
https://openaccess.leidenuniv.nl/handle/1887/37759

Other recent articles with relevant background on Boko Haram in
particular include the following from the Washington Post and the
New York Times.

“Here’s why so many people join Boko Haram, despite its notorious
violence,” by Hilary Matfess, Washington Post, April 26, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/hqw6og4

“Failure to Share Data Hampers War on Boko Haram in Africa,” by Eric
Schmitt and Dionne Searcey, New York Times, April 23, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/jzsmla7

“Women Who Fled Boko Haram Tell of Devastation and, Rarely, Hope,”
by Helene Cooper, New York Times, April 22, 2106
http://tinyurl.com/z48hplw

“Abducted Nigerian Girls Have Not Been Abandoned, U.S. Says,” by
Helene Cooper, April 20, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/z4bj6md

“Boko Haram still a threat months after ‘technical victory,’ by
Bradley Klapper|AP, Washington Post, April 19, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/h3dfy48

“What’s Worse Than a Girl Being Kidnapped?,” by Adaobi Tricia
Nwaubani, New York Times, April 15, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/hcak5ch

“Boko Haram kidnapped 276 girls two years ago. What happened to
them?,” by Kevin Sieff, Washington Post, April 14, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/zj57sxg

“Boko Haram Turns Female Captives Into Terrorists,” by Dionne
Searcey, New York Times, April 7, 2016 http://tinyurl.com/jqyxw2d

“They were freed from Boko Haram’s rape camps. But their nightmare
isn’t over,” by Kevin Sieff, Washington Post, April 3, 2016
http://tinyurl.com/zxcpob3

For previous AfricaFocus Bulletins on Nigeria, visit
http://www.africafocus.org/country/nigeria.php

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

Nigeria’s Displaced Women and Girls: Humanitarian Community at Odds,
Boko Haram Survivors Forsaken

Refugees International, April 21, 2016

http://www.refugeesinternational.org/reports/2016/nigeria

It has been two years since the world’s deadliest terrorist
organization – Boko Haram – abducted 271 girls from their high
school in the town of Chibok – a tragedy that would shine much
needed international attention on conflict in northeastern Nigeria.
Sadly, the Chibok girls are only one part of a much larger story of
violence against women and girls in the northeast. But the attention
on this remote corner of the Sahel has not translated into sustained
humanitarian assistance for all those that have been affected.
Humanitarian stakeholders are under tremendous strain due to the
enormity of the emergency, conflicts between aid agencies, limited
resources, and an ineffective partner in the Nigerian state. As a
result, the needs of all those whom the Chibok girls symbolize –
thousands upon thousands who have suffered gender-based violence at
Boko Haram’s hands – are being unaddressed. Moreover, the lackluster
humanitarian response is placing women and girls affected by Boko
Haram at further risk of gender-based violence.

Background

Northeast Nigeria has been the primary theater for the militant
group Boko Haram’s insurgency since 2009. Violence has ebbed and
flowed over the years as the insurgents evolved from a homegrown
uprising against the police in three states to a more sophisticated
and ruthless extremist Islamist group, which pledged allegiance to
ISIS in 2015. The sheer brutality of Boko Haram, marked by mass
abductions, indiscriminate killings, suicide bombings, sexual
violence, and slavery, has earned it the unsavory designation as the
world’s deadliest terrorist group. The toll is not certain, but
reportedly 20,000 have been killed as a result of the insurgency. In
2014, Boko Haram intensified its attacks, resulting in a sudden
growth in the number of internally displaced persons (IDPs) arriving
in Maiduguri, the capital city of the northeastern state of Borno.

Much criticism, both domestic and international, has been leveled at
the Nigerian government for its perceived failure to deploy a more
robust strategy to eliminate the scourge of Boko Haram. Muhammadu
Buhari made the defeat of Boko Haram a central pillar of his
successful campaign for the 2015 presidential elections. He assumed
power in May 2015, and in December announced that Nigeria had
technically defeated Boko Haram – a declaration found to be
outlandish by many Nigeria watchers, as violence continues. Although
the validity of this statement is arguable, the Nigerian Army (NA)
did intensify its campaign against Boko Haram in 2015, “liberating”
– in their words – areas that were under the militants’ control.
This campaign resulted in further displacement in Borno, including
into Maiduguri.

Multiple reports document the horrors that women and girls have
experienced under Boko Haram. Further, a recent report documents the
difficulties that abducted women and girls have reintegrating back
into their families and communities, particularly for those labeled
as “Boko Haram wives.” Yet there is a dearth of information on what
and how humanitarian assistance is serving the very specific needs
of these women and girls.

In February 2016, Refugees International (RI) conducted a mission to
Nigeria to assess the needs of those displaced in Borno State, and
how the humanitarian community can best serve women and girls. The
RI team met with federal and state authorities, the UN,
international non-governmental organizations (INGO) and community-
based organizations, human rights defenders, local volunteers,
members of the donor and diplomatic communities in Abuja and
Maiduguri, and IDPs and host community members in Maiduguri. The
humanitarian crisis facing the aid community in the northeast is
nothing short of daunting.

The Humanitarian Panorama

The humanitarian crisis facing the aid community in the northeast is
nothing short of daunting. According to the 2016 Humanitarian Needs
Overview (HNO), 14.8 million people are affected in four states of
the northeast. 7 The UN estimates that of this number, seven million
are in need, three million of whom are estimated to be entirely
inaccessible. It is worthwhile to note, however, that precise
numbers are difficult to attain due to the humanitarian access
constraints. This is especially the case for Borno, where nearly 70
percent of the territory was inaccessible at the time of the HNO.
Consequently, most humanitarians believe that the numbers of people
in need are much higher.

Overall, there are an estimated 2.2 million displaced in the
northeast, according to the International Organization for
Migration’s most recent displacement tracking exercise. 9 This is a
sharp increase from the much more modest figure of 261,000 in
December 2014, as per the HNO. The vast majority of the displaced –
1.3 million – are in Maiduguri and its environs. Their arrival more
than doubled the population of the city in a single year. Only
approximately eight percent of the IDPs are in government-run IDP
camps or settlements. The Nigerian authorities only deliver
humanitarian assistance to those in camps, which are managed by the
National and State Emergency Management Agencies (NEMA and SEMA,
respectively). The remainder must fend for themselves, depending on
the kindness of relatives and hosts among the local population –
hosts that are increasingly exhausting their limited resources – as
well as local faith-based institutions that have neither the
resources nor the expertise to deliver humanitarian aid. A very
small percentage of IDPs are being served by the small INGO
community.

Access to food – both in and out of the camps – was the primary
concern cited by IDPs with whom RI spoke. According to figures
released in March 2016 by the UN Office for Affairs (OCHA), an
estimated 2.5 million children are malnourished. Within the
government-run camps, the number of displaced far outstrips the
number of water, sanitation, and hygiene facilities that
international standards call for in camp settings, forcing women and
girls to wait for hours in lines, with many ultimately opting for
open urination and defecation. One INGO working in the host
communities in Maiduguri asserts that nearly every household is
housing IDPs, in some cases multiple families, and host families are
now selling their assets to be able to feed displaced people under
their care. Livelihood opportunities are grossly limited for those
living both inside and outside of camps. Finally, several
displacement sites have been targeted by Boko Haram suicide bombers,
leading to restrictive policies involving basic human rights such as
freedom of movement, which impact both IDPs’ protection and their
ability to participate in income-generating activities.

Against this backdrop, at the time of RI’s visit, there were only a
handful of UN agencies, with very limited personnel, and less than
ten international organizations operating in Maiduguri. At time of
writing, the 2016 UN humanitarian appeal for Nigeria is dangerously
underfunded. As of April, only $33.7 million of the $248 million
proposed for the UN humanitarian response plan—just 14 percent—has
been met.

Boko Haram’s survivors, in the shadow of humanitarian action

Amnesty International, Human Rights Watch, International Alert,
UNICEF, and several journalists have all reported on the horrors of
life under Boko Haram and the very specific needs of women they have
interviewed – medical, psychological, livelihood, and community
reconciliation opportunities. Yet it is RI’s assessment that there
has been minimal effort to identify and/or address these women and
girls’ needs, much less target them as priority beneficiaries for
any programming. The humanitarian crisis in Borno State has led to
infinite protection risks for women and girls. Boko Haram has
abducted countless women and girls throughout its campaign in the
northeast. No one is entirely certain how many women and girls have
been abducted to date, in part because the Nigerian authorities have
yet to respond to civil society’s desperate calls for a survey in
the northeast, by which families could register the data of their
missing. Whatever the figure, it is surely dwarfed by the number
that have been exposed to Boko Haram’s brutality during its campaign
to overrun and control territory, of which gender-based violence
(GBV) has been a feature. Definitive counts of those who have been
subjected to Boko Haram’s rule in this manner are difficult to come
by, but it is reasonable to believe that it figures in the
thousands. As IDP numbers swell in Maiduguri, so do the number of
women and girl survivors of Boko Haram’s horrifying GBV tactics. As
the NA clears Boko Haram from territory, it rescues people who had
been trapped, the majority of them women and girls, and takes many
of them to displacement sites. In the month of March 2016 alone,
troops had rescued 11,595 hostages from Boko Haram, according to NA
Spokesman, Colonel Sanu Usman.

According to humanitarians with whom RI spoke, Nigerian authorities
share little to no information on its process for vetting women and
girls and releasing them. Some humanitarians, however, believe that
it is quite simply because there is no formal process. Further,
there is no process for identifying women and girls that have
escaped and fled to Maiduguri without the assistance of the
military. And there is no mechanism by which the military and
humanitarians can coordinate to identify women and girls so they can
benefit from much-needed services. RI interviewed one 14-year-old 14
who exemplified the protection risks this situation creates. She was
abducted during an attack on her village of Baga and taken as a wife
by a Boko Haram IDP women and children living in a host community in
Maiduguri.

…

During RI’s mission, only one humanitarian agency told the RI team
that procedures were in place to identify and provide services to
women and girls associated with Boko Haram, or for the women and
girls that are brought to Maiduguri on a near-daily basis by the
military. …

However, life for a woman or girl in the host communities is not
necessarily more secure. All of the displaced women living in host
communities whom RI interviewed spoke of the risks of violence. IMC
carried out a safety audit in the seven host communities where they
implement programs, and the three top concerns women expressed, in
order of priority, were domestic violence, rape, and denial of
resources. According to the women IMC serves, domestic violence has
become a serious issue due to food insecurity. Women suffer beatings
when they cannot provide food or when they ask for money to buy
food. On the third month of IMC programming, volunteers were
recording as many as twenty rapes per week in the seven communities.
Women are also reporting that they are often denied resources to
purchase medicines or food. When asking a group of women in a focus
group what self-care they practice to alleviate their trauma, RI
learned that women and girls are reportedly purchasing and drinking
bottles of cough syrup to “go to sleep and forget.”

There is no meaningful integrated GBV-prevention and response
programming in Maiduguri. …  To RI’s knowledge, at the time of
RI’s visit, only one INGO – International Medical Corps (IMC) – had
a holistic GBV prevention and response program that included
sensitization, referrals for medical care, and psychosocial
counseling, but the reach was limited to only seven host communities
and three IDP camps. However, this short-term U.S. government-
funded program is coming to a close, pending the acquisition of
alternative funding sources. Several other organizations were doing
psychosocial counseling for women and children, but they did not
specifically fall under the rubric of GBV.

…

Further, medical interventions designed specifically for survivors
of sexual violence across the board are limited due to an
unanticipated reason: the global displacement crisis. The pressures
on the global humanitarian system are reverberating in northeast
Nigeria: the agency mandated with procuring Inter-Agency
Reproductive Health kits, the United Nations Population Fund
(UNFPA), has been unable to secure a shipment of Kit 5, the medical
kit designed to treat STIs. UNFPA’s suppliers in Denmark, China, and
the Netherlands informed the country office that they were unable to
fulfill the purchase order due to the overwhelming global demand;
their supplies are exhausted. Kits are currently under production
and should be made available to UNFPA Nigeria at the end of April
2016.

…

RI is also concerned that traditional humanitarian psychosocial
support programming may not be of the caliber that the context
warrants. The trauma endured by the Boko Haram-affected populations
cannot be underestimated. Community based organizations told RI that
apart from the suffering resulting from abduction, sexual violence,
the loss of partners and children, the violence of war, and loss of
all assets, Nigerian women in the northeast are also facing a
profound gender identity crisis. It is not the woman’s traditional
role to “bury one’s husband” or to be the head of a household, and
the rapidly shifting role is compounding the trauma they have
endured and imperiling their resilience capabilities.

According to service providers and some IDP women who chose to speak
about their mental health, women feel helpless, fear men, feel they
have lost all self-worth, and are hopeless when facing the
uncertainty of the future. When asking a group of women in a focus
group what self-care they practice to alleviate their trauma, RI
learned that women and girls are reportedly purchasing and drinking
bottles of cough syrup to “go to sleep and forget.” Upon further
investigation, RI learned that this is not a pre-existing coping
mechanism amongst women and girls. In fact, demand for cough syrup
in camps has increased such that supplies have become scarcer,
driving the price up from 60 Naira per bottle to 150-200 Naira.
Meanwhile, multiple international and local aid workers expressed
concern that some current UN and INGO psychosocial support
interventions may not be staffed adequately, contrary to what their
own literature might otherwise indicate. Aid workers highlighted
that several women’s safe spaces – tents – erected by one UN agency
are often empty. IDP women from several sites confirmed to RI that
they are unaware of trauma support programming and that the tents
are going unused.

The fact that GBV programming does not figure among core
humanitarian programming is a failure to global commitments to both
prioritize women and girls, and place GBV prevention and response
programming in its much-deserved category of a “lifesaving”
activity. On the contrary, one senior UNFPA staff member told RI
that a request to access UN Central Emergency Response Funds (CERF)
to hold a GBV referrals pathway workshop was denied on the basis
that “CERF funds can only be used for life-saving activities.”

…

**********************************************

Nigeria: Military Cover-Up of Mass Slaughter at Zaria Exposed

Amnesty International Press Release

22 April 2016

http://www.amnesty.org – Direct URL: http://tinyurl.com/jnafcom

Mass slaughter of hundreds of men, women and children by soldiers in
Zaria and the attempted cover-up of this crime demonstrates an utter
contempt for human life and accountability, said Amnesty
International as it publishes evidence gathered on the ground
revealing how the Nigerian military burned people alive, razed
buildings and dumped victims’ bodies in mass graves.

The true horror of what happened over those two days in Zaria is
only now coming to light. Bodies were left littered in the streets
and piled outside the mortuary. Some of the injured were burned
alive Netsanet Belay, Amnesty International

The report, Unearthing the truth: Unlawful killings and mass cover-
up in Zaria, contains shocking eyewitness testimony of large-scale
unlawful killings by the Nigerian military and exposes a crude
attempt by the authorities to destroy and conceal evidence.

“The true horror of what happened over those two days in Zaria is
only now coming to light. Bodies were left littered in the streets
and piled outside the mortuary. Some of the injured were burned
alive,” said Netsanet Belay, Amnesty International’s Research and
Advocacy Director for Africa.

“Our research, based on witness testimonies and analysis of
satellite images, has located one possible mass grave. It is time
now for the military to come clean and admit where it secretly
buried hundreds of bodies.”

More than 350 people are believed to have been unlawfully killed by
the military between 12 and 14 December, following a confrontation
between members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) and
soldiers in Zaria, Kaduna state.

IMN supporters – some armed with batons, knives, and machetes – had
refused to clear the road near their headquarters, the Hussainiyya,
for a military convoy to pass. The army has claimed that IMN
supporters attacked the convoy in an attempt to assassinate the
Chief of Army Staff. IMN members deny this.

Following an initial confrontation the military surrounded other
locations where IMN supporters had gathered, notably at the
residential compound of IMN leader Ibrahim Al-Zakzaky. Some people
were killed as a result of indiscriminate fire. Others appeared to
have been deliberately targeted.

All available information indicates that the deaths of protesters
were the consequence of excessive, and arguably, unnecessary use of
force.

Children injured and killed

Zainab, a 16-year-old schoolgirl, told Amnesty International: “We
were in our school uniforms. My friend Nusaiba Abdullahi was shot in
her forehead. We took her to a house where they treated the injured
but, before reaching the house, she already died.” A 10-year-old boy
who was shot in the leg told Amnesty International how his older
brother was shot in the head as they tried to leave the compound.
“We went out to try to shelter in a nearby house but we got shot.”

Shot and burned alive

On 13 December, two buildings within Ibrahim Al-Zakzaky’s compound,
one of which was being used as a makeshift medical facility and
mortuary, were attacked by soldiers. Alyyu, a 22-year-old student,
told Amnesty International that he was shot in the chest outside the
compound and was taken inside for treatment: “There were lots of
injured people in several rooms. There were dead bodies in a room
and also in the courtyard. Around 12-1pm soldiers outside called on
people to come out, but people were too scared to go out. We knew
they would kill us. Soldiers threw grenades inside the compound. I
saw one soldier on the wall of the courtyard shooting inside.”

One mother described a phone conversation with one of her 19-year-
old sons before he was killed alongside his twin brother and their
step brother and sister in the compound. “They are shooting those
injured one by one,” he told her.

As soldiers set fire to the makeshift medical facility in the
compound that afternoon, Yusuf managed to escape despite serious
gunshot wounds: “Those who were badly injured and could not escape
were burned alive,” he told Amnesty International. “I managed to get
away from the fire by crawling on my knees until I reached a nearby
house where I was able to hide until the following day. I don’t know
how many of the wounded were burned to death. Tens and tens of
them.”

Footage believed to have been shot on mobile phone by IMN supporters
after the incident shows bodies with gunshot wounds as well as
charred bodies strewn around the compound.

Cover-up

After the incident the military sealed off the areas around al-
Zakzaky’s compound, the Hussainiyya and other locations. Bodies were
taken away, sites were razed to the ground, the rubble removed,
bloodstains washed off, and bullets and spent cartridge removed from
the streets.

Witnesses saw piles of bodies outside the morgue of Ahmadu Bello
University Teaching Hospital in Zaria. A senior medical source told
Amnesty International that the military sealed off the area around
the morgue for two days. During that time he saw army vehicles
“coming and going”.

A witness described to Amnesty International what he saw outside the
hospital mortuary on the evening of 14 December: “It was dark and
from far I could only see a big mound but when I got closer I saw it
was a huge pile of corpses on top of each other.  I have never seen
so many dead bodies. I got very scared and run away. It was a
terrible sight and I can’t get it out of my mind.”

Another witness told the organisation how he had seen diggers
excavating holes at the site of the suspected mass grave: “There
were five or six large trucks and several smaller military vehicles
and they spent hours digging and unloading the trucks’ cargo into
the hole they dug and then covered it again with the earth they had
dug out.  They were there from about 1 or 2 am until about 5 am.  I
don’t know what they buried. It looked like bodies, but I could not
get near.”

Amnesty International identified and visited the location of a
possible mass grave near Mando. Satellite images of the site taken
on 2 November and 24 December 2015 show disturbed earth spanning an
area of approximately 1000 square metres. Satellite pictures also
show the complete destruction of buildings and mosques.

“It is clear that the military not only used unlawful and excessive
force against men, women and children, unlawfully killing hundreds,
but then made considerable efforts to try to cover-up these crimes,”
said Netsanet Belay.

“Four months after the massacre the families of the missing are
still awaiting news of their loved ones. A full independent forensic
investigation is long overdue. The bodies must be exhumed, the
incident must be impartially and independently investigated and
those responsible must be held to account.”

On Monday 25 April, the military are expected to give evidence to
the Judicial Commission of Inquiry established by the Kaduna State
Government in January 2016. On 11 April, a Kaduna State government
official told the Judicial Commission of Inquiry that the bodies of
347 members of the Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) were collected
from the hospital mortuary and an army depot in Zaria and buried
secretly in a mass grave near Mando (outside the town of Kaduna) on
the night of 14-15 December. The IMN claim a further 350 people who
went missing during the incidents in Zaria remain unaccounted for.

During field research carried out in Kaduna state and Federal
Capital Territory (FCT) in February 2016, Amnesty International
delegates interviewed 92 people, including victims and their
relatives, eyewitnesses, lawyers and medical personnel. Attempts
were made to interview members of the military.

IMN leader Al-Zakzaky and his wife Zeinat Al-Zakzaky were arrested
and held incommunicado. They were only allowed access to their
lawyer for the first time on 1 April 2015, three and a half months
after their arrest. Amnesty International has not had access to
those who remain in detention but has received information from
medical sources that some of the detainees were not allowed access
to necessary medical care for several weeks after their arrest.

Amnesty International is calling for those IMN supporters charged in
connection with this incident to be tried promptly and fairly and
for those still held in detention without charge to be either
immediately charged or released.

*****************************************************

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a
particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please
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mentioned. For a full archive and other resources, see
http://www.africafocus.org

AfricaFocus Bulletin
April 11, 2016 (160411)
(Reposted from sources cited below)

Editor’s Note

“In other words, the leaks reveal just how the planet’s wealthiest
and most powerful citizens hide their money – trillions of it – in
offshore tax shelters like the British Virgin Islands or the
Seychelles with the help of law firms in swampy backwaters like
Panama. Over 11-million horribly incriminating documents, and this
is just one – if one of the more prominent – of the many law firms
specialising in this line of work.” – Daily Maverick, South Africa

For a version of this Bulletin in html format, more suitable for
printing, go to http://www.africafocus.org/docs16/pan1604.php, and
click on “format for print or mobile.”

To share this on Facebook, click on
https://www.facebook.com/sharer/sharer.php?u=http://www.africafocus.org/docs16/pan1604.php

The system is world-wide, and the Panama Papers leaks unprecedented
in scale. The volume is such that it is daunting even to read a
fraction of the stories that are coming out, with their political
implications for Iceland, the UK, Russia, China, and multiple
African countries. While names from the United States are relatively
few to date, as the Panama law firm involved focused its client
outreach on Europe and Latin America, the scandal has still called
attention to similar practices which are even more advanced in the
United States itself. And the story is advancing at country level in
many places, with the involvement of many African investigative
journalists on the ground, working together in the African Network
of Centers for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR).

This AfricaFocus Bulletin contains two articles focused on
revelations related to the heads of state of South Africa and the
Democratic Republic of the Congo, and a summary of Africa-related
stories (so far) from the ANCIR. Expect many more to come. The ANCIR
also has a special website for contributing new leaks anonymously to
investigative reporters at https://afrileaks.org/

For a wide range of previous background articles on this global
system of illicit financial flows and its implications for Africa,
visit http://www.africafocus.org/intro-iff.php

Among just a few of recent articles worth noting, an overview in The
Nation (http://tinyurl.com/hqdnovn) by Chuck Collins of
http://inequality.org, Uganda civil society coalition statement (
https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/afritax/4xjUSb7Jo3M), and a
related but independent investigative report in the Rand Daily Mail
on Zuma, Putin, the Guptas and nuclear power plans (http://tinyurl.com/zh9ppym).

For more recent updates and advocacy, see, in addition to other
links included in this Bulletin,
http://www.taxjusticeafrica.net/en/home/,
https://financialtransparency.org/, and
https://thefactcoalition.org/

And, after a slow start because they were not among those included
in the investigative group, major newspapers such as The New York
Times and the Washington Post are also giving major attention to the
leaks and to their implications for the status of the United States
itself as one of the leading “tax havens” anchoring this global
system. See, for a few examples, http://tinyurl.com/zaadjup,
http://tinyurl.com/guw6ucv, http://tinyurl.com/ze767av, and
http://tinyurl.com/hyj8lwr

++++++++++++++++++++++end editor’s note+++++++++++++++++

“Panama Papers – How Zuma’s Family Is Implicated in the Greatest
Corruption Data Dump of All Time”

Richard Poplak, Daily Maverick, Apr 4, 2016

http://tinyurl.com/hu8y4hg

It’s early days. But when it comes to the so-called Panama Papers –
a 2.4 terabyte leak of documents from a Panama-based law firm called
Mossack Fonseca – it does appear that we’re dealing with a data leak
bigger than both Wikileaks and the Snowden files. Most important, it
regards something we have always known, but have struggled to prove:
the rich and celebrated hide their money in secret offshore tax
shelters. Welcome to one of the biggest stories of our time. And
while you’re settling in, try guessing which famous South African
family immediately pops up in the files?

Here’s a booming salvo from the vast global digi-mocracy we were
promised by the earliest of the internet’s Utopians: Clive Khulubuse
Zuma is a big fat scumbag. Oh, I’m aware that this was common
knowledge before some unbelievably heroic soul snagged 2.4 terabytes
of filth from the servers of a Panamanian law firm called Mossack
Fonseca. A resulting collaborative media project has mined the data
for recognisable names, and fancy-ass notables like Vladimir Putin,
Lionel Messi and the president of Iceland are now implicated in a
reverse alchemical process that has turned money into – fresh air!

In other words, the leaks reveal just how the planet’s wealthiest
and most powerful citizens hide their money – trillions of it – in
offshore tax shelters like the British Virgin Islands or the
Seychelles with the help of law firms in swampy backwaters like
Panama. Over 11-million horribly incriminating documents, and this
is just one – if one of the more prominent – of the many law firms
specialising in this line of work.

Which, in a round-about way, brings us once again to our thesis:
Clive Khulubuse Zuma is a big fat scumbag.

The following is yanked from a site called The Center for Public
Integrity, which serves as the landing page for much of the Panama
Papers data dump. And grok what bubbles up on the very first day –
the very first hour! – of the leak:

Clive Khulubuse Zuma is a nephew of South Africa’s President Jacob
Zuma. A mining magnate, Khulubuse Zuma has reportedly enjoyed a
lifestyle of cigars and up to 19 collectible cars. In June 2015, a
South African court found Zuma liable as chairman in the collapse of
a gold mining company that led to more than 5,000 job losses. In
court submissions, Zuma denied responsibility for the company’s
failure.

Zuma was authorised to represent Caprikat Limited, one of two
offshore companies that controversially acquired oil fields in the
Democratic Republic of Congo. In late summer 2010, as published
reports raised questions about the acquisition, British Virgin
Islands authorities ordered Mossack Fonseca to provide background
information on Zuma, which the law firm had not previously obtained.
That same year, Mossack Fonseca decided to end its relationship with
the companies. Zuma and representatives of the companies have
rejected allegations of wrongdoing and claimed the oil deals are
“quite attractive” to the DRC government.

To that last part: yeah, whatever. But what this document proves,
without any shadow of a doubt, is that Clive Khulubuse Zuma is a big
fat scumbag. More specifically, it reminds us that President’s
Zuma’s nephew was linked to Caprikat Limited, one of two companies
that successfully scammed what could amount to a R100-billion oil
fortune from the beleaguered people of the Democratic Republic of
the Congo.

What, you ask, does our blame-free, super-apologetic president have
to do with any of this?

Nothing. Except for the fact that in 2010, he paid a visit to DRC
President Joseph Kabila in Kinshasa, where they allegedly had a
discussion about these impressive oil fields, and nudge-nudge, wink-
wink, the corpulent Khulubuse would later come right.

Joseph Kabila has more than his fair share of fat scumbag friends,
but it does seem that Khulubuse Zuma served as one of the more
important. It’s a grim little instance of the kind of collusion that
goes on all the time – two powerful dudes meet, and billions of
dollars goes errant shortly thereafter.

As the Panama Papers now make achingly clear, this is how the world
works. The average South African citizen may be enraged with Zuma,
the Guptas, or the Zuptas, but we now have proof that they’re little
more than a pimple on the ass of an endless global corruption
network that has no overarching aim – no Illuminati-like pseudo
religious objective – other than fleecing as much dough as possible
for as long as possible. Everyone – the prime minister of freaking
Iceland included – is in on the game. The game being petty theft on
an unpetty scale.

In this it would be impossible, embarrassing even, for a Zuma to be
left out of the conversation.

The Panama Papers are one of the most significant leaks of all time,
and they are currently laying bare a legal-ish loophole that has
disappeared trillions of dollars from the global financial system.
There is much, much more to come in what promises to be the biggest
continuing news story of our epoch.

But only hours after the leak was made public, a Zuma pops up. And
he’s not alone. The world, we now know for sure, is full of them. DM

**************************************************************

“The entities behind dodgy Congo deal”

Craig McKune, Business Day Live, Apr 08 2016

http://tinyurl.com/z6j3tuk

[The amaBhungane Centre for Investigative Journalism (
http://amaBhungane.co.za), an independent non-profit, produced this
story.]

THE Panama Papers data leak has unmasked the people originally
behind a highly controversial Congolese oil deal that was fronted by
President Jacob Zuma’s nephew Khulubuse Zuma.

One is South African businessman Mark Willcox, although in 2010, he
told amaBhungane that he held no financial interest in the deal,
however remote. Willcox was then CEO of Tokyo Sexwale’s Mvelaphanda
Holdings, and Sexwale served in Zuma’s cabinet at the time.

The other is the family of controversial Israeli citizen and diamond
scion Dan Gertler, a personal friend of Democratic Republic of Congo
(DRC) President Joseph Kabila. Gertler’s stake was made public in
2012, two years after the deal.

Hidden behind layers of offshore opacity, Willcox and Gertler’s
family were intended to be the original owners of Caprikat and
Foxwhelp, the mysterious British Virgin Islands (BVI) companies to
which Kabila handed highly sought-after oil rights in June 2010,
according to the leaked papers.

Willcox said this week he never accepted these shares. The evidence
appears to support this.

The papers indicate that Khulubuse Zuma held no formal stake,
despite his 2010 claim that he was the sole owner.

The political exposure of the deal to Kabila, Jacob Zuma, and
Sexwale raised concerns in 2010, but everyone involved denied that
the politicians played any role.

The Panama Papers do not shed any more light on this. But the high
level of ownership secrecy that they show — including the fact that
the Panamanian law firm that set up Caprikat and Foxwhelp was long
in the dark about the owners — may underscore concerns about
political exposure.

Through spokesman Vuyo Mkhize, Khulubuse Zuma declined to answer
questions, saying he had no obligation to declare his private
business interests publicly.

…

ON SUNDAY, journalists around the world began to publish a series of
exposés based on the Panama Papers, a trove of 1.5-million leaked
confidential documents, or 2.6 terabytes of data, from Panamanian
law firm Mossack Fonseca.

The cache was obtained by the International Consortium of
Investigative Journalists and the German newspaper Süddeutsche
Zeitung and other media partners.

The documents name politicians, businesspeople, and celebrities
around the world, who have used bank accounts in offshore tax havens
and jurisdictions that offer a high degree of corporate anonymity.
In many cases, the suggestion is that these people used the offshore
financial system to avoid taxes or hide their wealth, but most deny
any wrongdoing.

Included in the documents is e-mailed correspondence among BVI
regulators, Mossack Fonseca, and Hassans, an international law firm
in Gibraltar that conducts business with Gertler’s group of
companies.

The correspondence was sparked when Foxwhelp and Caprikat hit the
news in June 2010. Kabila had just approved their production-sharing
agreement with the Congolese government for the two blocks in Lake
Albert, along the Congolese-Uganda border.

Until then, the blocks had been allocated to Irish oil major,
Tullow. But Kabila’s action had nullified this arrangement and
Tullow was furious.

It accused Congo of orchestrating a “smash-and-grab”, and questioned
the legitimacy of Caprikat and Foxwhelp, which had just been founded
and had no energy sector experience.

This week, Gertler’s Fleurette Group countered that “Tullow did not
have a valid contract with the DRC. (It) took Fleurette to court
over this issue and lost conclusively.”

Khulubuse Zuma emerged at the time as a spokesman for the two BVI
companies. He claimed to own them. AmaBhungane revealed at the time
that Khulubuse Zuma had signed the production-sharing agreement on
Caprikat’s behalf and that Jacob Zuma’s lawyer Michael Hulley had
signed for Foxwhelp.

Hulley did not respond to several messages seeking his comment.

The controversy deepened when it emerged that Willcox had travelled
to Kinshasa with Khulubuse Zuma and Hulley, and that the BVI
companies had used Mvelaphanda and Sexwale-linked addresses as their
legal domicilium.

Willcox said at the time that he had simply given Khulubuse Zuma
“strategic advice” on the deal, but strongly denied any personal
financial interest.

About two years later, one of Kabila’s cabinet ministers let slip
that Caprikat and Foxwhelp were actually Gertler’s companies.
Gertler did not challenge this, and now openly states that his
Fleurette Group owns 100% of Caprikat and Foxwhelp.

According to Fleurette Group, the oil blocks hold estimated reserves
of 3-billion barrels. Fleurette says it has spent $100m developing
the field.

But while the deal’s political exposure was downplayed, there was
panic among Mossack Fonseca’s staff in Panama and the BVI. E-mail
correspondence in the papers suggests that when Mossack Fonseca
registered Caprikat and Foxwhelp in March 2010, they did not know
that Willcox and Gertler were intended to be their ultimate
beneficial owners despite, “know your client” requirements.

And when they learned through news reports that Khulubuse Zuma, a
“politically exposed person”, had been granted power of attorney to
sign contracts, they considered this reason enough to resign as the
companies’ registering agent.

Having not received a proper explanation from Hassans, the Gibraltar
law firm representing Gertler, one senior staffer wrote to his
colleagues: “Perhaps we need to send a clear message that we will
not be a dump for dodgy companies.”

When a Hassans staffer wrote back, she sought to ease Mossack
Fonseca’s concerns: “I have contacted the lawyers here at Hassans
who deal with these companies from this end. They have clarified the
situation, which seems to be a case of bad press and sour grapes.”

…

That same month, Mossack Fonseca’s alarm bells rang over two more
BVI companies registered at Hassans’s request: Norseville Estates
and Burford Commercial. Apparently they had also failed to do any
due diligence on these and did not know who owned them.

The e-mails flowed back and forth, with apparently frantic Mossack
Fonseca staffers setting deadlines for Hassans that were usually not
met.

One e-mail suggested the reason for the panic: “It is necessary that
the client (Hassans) understands the urgency of this, as in the eyes
of the (financial regulator), this info should have been in our
offices in BVI…. We are in breach of the obligation to have the info
on BVI.”

After several days, Hassans wrote and explained the Foxwhelp and
Caprikat shareholding, but only up to a point. The letter described
a Cayman Islands investment fund, owned by Norseville and Burford in
Panama, whose true ownership was masked by a nominee shareholder,
and a chain of beneficial ownership reaching through foundations and
trusts in Liechtenstein, Gibraltar, and the BVI.

The letter did not disclose the identity of the real people behind
the web.

Having had enough, Mossack Fonseca’s Jennifer Mossack wrote to say
it was resigning from Foxwhelp, Caprikat, Norseville and Burford
“based on the lack of due diligence information provided by you. We
stand the possibility of being fined or our licence being revoked or
suspended for noncompliance with the relevant legislation in the
jurisdiction of BVI and Panama.”

It was only then that Hassans disclosed that Willcox and the family
of Gertler were behind the structure, with 10% and 90%,
respectively.

The news came as a relief to one senior Mossack Fonseca staffer: “If
these are really their clients, we are speaking about very high-
profile and worldwide-known entrepreneurs. The fact that they are
doing business in Africa makes their position difficult. We would
need to analyse further, but it is good to know that they are not
machine guns (sic) criminals.”

By this stage, however, the BVI’s Financial Investigations Agency
was asking questions, demanding all due diligence information,
particularly in respect of Khulubuse Zuma. A copy of his passport
and various bills were passed on.

But the agency still required the share register of the investment
fund that owned Foxwhelp and Caprikat. Nearly a year later, Mossack
Fonseca complained that this was never received.

According to one final e-mail before it dumped the four Gertler-
linked companies, Jennifer Mossack complained: “Hassans has proven
to be unco-operative, secretive, and dishonest with us as they hid
the identity of their client and are apparently assisting him with
his asset protection.”

Willcox says he has never heard of Mossack Fonseca, Norseville, or
Ranna Investments, an entity the documents indicate held his
intended stake.

…

His lawyer Rael Gootkin says: “It is possible that it could have
been part of Fleurette’s initial structuring to offer such a
shareholding to our client. This factually never materialised.”

He says Fleurette approached Willcox in 2010 “to find an industry
partner and/or a capital partner to develop the oil blocks”.

In response to questions this week, the Gibraltar firm says:
“Hassans fully complies with all local and international standards
regarding ownership disclosures and (know your client) practices.

“Details regarding ultimate beneficial ownership was made available
to Mossack Fonseca at all times.

“We understand that the only item of due diligence outstanding was
the register of members of the (investment fund), which, as
explained, could not be provided, as the fund had not been
launched.”

A Mossack Fonseca statement says: “Before we agree to work with a
client in any way, we conduct a thorough due-diligence process. We
follow both the letter and spirit of the law. Because we do, we have
not once in nearly 40 years of operation been charged with criminal
wrongdoing.”

A spokesperson for the Fleurette group says: “Businesses all over
the world use special-purpose vehicles in their corporate structures
for a variety of reasons. Fleurette uses companies incorporated
offshore to ensure tax efficiency.”

Khulubuse Zuma’s role remains a mystery. Fleurette says: “Mr Zuma
did have some early involvement as a signatory for the companies, at
a time when it was expected that he would have a greater role to
play; however, that role did not materialise.”

**************************************************************

#PanamaPapers

How The Elite Hide Their Wealth

https://panamapapers.investigativecenters.org/

[Excerpts from page as of April 11, 2016]

The Panama Papers: About this project

The Panama Papers is an unprecedented investigation that reveals the
offshore links of some of the globe’s most prominent figures.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ),
together with the German newspaper Suddeutsche Zeitung and more than
100 other media partners, including the African Network of Centers
for Investigative Reporting (ANCIR), spent a year sifting through
11.5 million leaked files to expose the offshore holdings of world
political leaders, links to global scandals, and details of the
hidden financial dealings of fraudsters, drug traffickers,
billionaires, celebrities, sports stars and more.

The trove of documents is likely the biggest leak of inside
information in history. It includes nearly 40 years of data from a
little-known but powerful law firm based in Panama. That firm,
Mossack Fonseca, has offices in more than 35 locations around the
globe, and is one of the world’s top creators of shell companies,
the corporate structures that can be used to hide ownership of
assets.

…

As ANCIR started researching, it discovered data disclosing 40 years
of service from Mossack Fonseca stretching from Uganda to Namibia to
Sierra Leone. The company’s questionable dealings is already well
known after being exposed by investigative journalists such as Ken
Silverstein.

ANCIR and its media partners’ investigations led to findings around
Uganda’s missing taxes from oil revenue; a mega-infrastructure deal
in Namibia connected to a FIFA-related entity; secrecy in
Steinmetz’s diamond empire; and hidden players in Angola’s Sovereign
Wealth Fund, to mention a few.

Further explosive stories from Zimbabwe, Kenya, South Africa and
Nigeria will follow this week.

But the data revealed something far more insidious than a
willingness to look past illegal activities.

It reflects a deliberate design on the part of companies like
Mossack Fonseca to commercialise the inherent weaknesses of national
and international legal and financial regimes by bulldozing the
substance, process and purpose of “due diligence”.

Thanks to these structures – banking secrecy, opaque shell entities,
use of nominees to conceal beneficial owners etc – each year, the
continent loses some $150 billion to illicit financial flows (PDF)

[for links to these stories, and more to be added, got to the ANCIR
website home page at https://panamapapers.investigativecenters.org/]

Namibia – Leaked documents show details about a well-publicised
mafia’s business connection between a convicted mafioso and Zacky
Nujoma, the youngest son of founding president Sam Nujoma.

Uganda – Leaked documents show the paper trail of the Heritage Oil
and Gas Ltd Company’s attempts at avoiding tax payment in Uganda,
writes Tabu Butagira.

Nigeria – Africa’s richest man, Aliko Dangote, and his brother Sayyu
Dantata have been linked to shell companies in tax havens, writes
Joshua Olufemi and Emmanuel Mayah.

Kenya – Kenya’s Deputy Chief Justice Kalpana Rawal was a director
and a shareholder of four companies located in a known tax haven,
writes Jacqui Kubania

DRC – Despite international laws stipulating disclosure of the
origins of gold, a tranche of leaked documents points to unsavoury
behaviour by tax havens trading in commodities, writes Khadija
Sharife.

Botswana – The president of Botswana’s highest court, Ian Kirby, has
invested in seven offshore companies domiciled and registered in a
tax haven of the British Virgin Islands, writes Ntibinyane
Ntibinyane.

Namibia – The tender for the Walvis Bay port in Namibia is tied to a
Trinidad politician with links to Brazil’s ‘Car Wash’ scandal,
writes Shinovene Immanuel.

Sierra Leone – Dodgy dealings within the Steinmetz Group seems to
indicate undervaluing of diamonds, which is costing Sierra Leone tax
payments, reports Khadija Sharife and Silas Gbandia.

Zimbabwe – The leaks show an offshore company called HR Consultancy
had been created to pay salaries to Zimplats, which is largely owned
by South Africa’s Impala Platinum Mines. However, it denies any
knowledge of the HR Consultancy and its purpose, writes Ray Choto.

Guinea – Leaked documents pry open the corporate structure of
companies involved in a mining rights scandal in Guinea, writes
Khadija Sharife

Senegal – Homme d’affaires sénégalais a créé des sociétés offshore
grâce à l’entreprise Mossack Fonseca. Les documents citent également
l’architecte Pierre Goudiaby Atepa et Aliou Sow, l’entrepreneur du
Sahel Société des entreprises (CSE).

Tunisia РUne fuite de documents internes r̩v̬le la cr̩ation de
sociétés offshore via Panama et expose comment le droit tunisien est
contourné pour éviter de payer des impôts sur les actifs à
l’étranger.

Mali – Les fuites révèlent que le milliardaire Seydou Kane , l’homme
d’affaires puissance Mali-Gabonaise, a créé deux sociétés offshore.
Il est également impliqué dans une affaire de blanchiment d’argent à
Paris.

Tunisia – En plein entre-deux-tours de l’élection presidentielle,
Mohsen Marzouk, alors directeur de campagne de Béji Caid Essebsi,
prend contact avec Mossack Fonseca, pour ouvrir une société
offshore.

Senegal РLe proc̬s pour enrichissement illicite de Karim Wade, fils
de l’ancien président sénégalais Abdoulaye Wade, a connu son verdict
il y a un an. Il s’était terminé avec la condamnation par la Cour de
répression de l’enrichissement illicite (Crei) de M. Wade-fils et de
ses co-accusés à des peines de prison ferme.

*****************************************************

AfricaFocus Bulletin is an independent electronic publication
providing reposted commentary and analysis on African issues, with a
particular focus on U.S. and international policies. AfricaFocus
Bulletin is edited by William Minter.

AfricaFocus Bulletin can be reached at africafocus@igc.org. Please
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Κυριακή, 10 Απριλίου 2016

Pablo Picasso- Why I became a Communist

http://communismgr.blogspot.gr/2016/04/pablo-picasso-why-i-became-communist.html

Why I became a Communist.

Pablo Picasso, October 1944.

 

My JOINING the Communist Party is a logical step in my life, my work and gives them their meaning. Through design and color, 1 have tried to penetrate deeper into a knowledge of the world and of men so that this knowledge might free us. In my own way I have always said what I considered most true, most just and best and, therefore, most beautiful. But during the oppression and the insurrection I felt that that was not enough, that I had to fight not only with painting but with my whole being. Previously, out of a sort of “innocence,” I had not understood this. I have become a Communist because our party strives more than any other to know and to build the world, to make men clearer thinkers, more free and more happy. 

 

I have become a Communist because the Communists are the bravest in France, in the Soviet Union, as they are in my own country, Spain. I have never felt more free, more complete than since I jomed. While I wait for the time when Spain can take me back again, the French Communist Party is a fatherland for me. In it I find again all my friends – the great scientists Paul Langevin and Frederick Joliot-Curie, the great writers Louis Aragon and Paul Eluard, and so many of the beautiful faces of the insurgents of Paris. I am again among my brothers.

Τετάρτη, 6 Απριλίου 2016

Pablo Neruda- Ode to Lenin

 http://communismgr.blogspot.gr/2016/04/pablo-neruda-ode-to-lenin.html

 

I

Lenin, to sing to you

I must say farewell to words:

I must write with trees, with wheels,

with plows, with cereals.

You’re concrete

as facts and earth.

There never was

a more earthly man

than V. Ulyanov.

There are other imposing men

who like churches are used to

conversing with the clouds,

they are tall, solitary men.

Lenin made a pact with the earth.

He came from farther away than anyone,

People,

rivers, hills,

steppes,

were an open book,

and he read,

read farther than anyone,

clearer than anyone.

He looked deeply

into the people,

admired them like a well,

examined them as

they were an unknown mineral

he had discovered.

Water needed to be taken from the well,

the dynamic light needed to be elevated,

the secret treasure

of the people,

so everything germinated and hatched

to be worthy of time and earth.

 

II

Beware of confusing him with a frigid

engineer,

beware of confusing him with an

ardent mystic.

His intelligence blazed without

becoming ashes,

death has yet to freeze his heart of fire.

 

III

I like seeing Lenin fishing in the

clearness

of Lake Lakhta, and those waters are

like a small mirror lost amid the grass

of the vast, cold, organized north:

those solitudes, disdainful solitudes,

processing plants martyred by night

and snow,

the arctic whistle of the wind in its

cabin.

I like seeing him there alone listening

to the rain shower, the trembling flight

of turtledoves,

the intense pulsation of the pristine

forest,

Lenin attentive to the forest and life,

listening to the wind’s steps and to

history

in the solemnity of nature.

 

IV

Some men were only good for studying,

deep book, passionate science,

and other men had

as their virtue the soul of the movement.

Lenin had two wings:

wisdom and the movement.

He created by means of thought,

deciphered enigmas,

went on breaking the masks

of truth and man

and was everywhere,

was simultaneously in all places.

 

IX

Thank you, Lenin,

for the energy and the teachings,

thank you for the firmness,

thank you for the Leningrad and the steppes.

Thank you, Lenin,

for the hope.