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‘Jonathan Should Address Violence, Corruption, Impunity’
- By Williams Ekanem
- Published June 6th, 2011
- Washington File
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President Goodluck Jonathan, should take immediate and concrete steps to address pervasive human rights problems in Nigeria, Human Rights Watch said last week. The President, according to the group, should focus in particular on large-scale violence, endemic corruption, and a lack of accountability for abuses.
“The profound challenges facing Nigeria are, at their heart, human rights problems,” said Corinne Dufka, senior West Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Jonathan presidency should place human rights, and long overdue reforms, at the top of the administration’s agenda.”
According to the group, Inter-communal, political, and sectarian violence have claimed more than 15,700 lives since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999. Government security forces are widely implicated in serious abuses, including extrajudicial killings and torture. The ruling elite has squandered and siphoned off the nation’s tremendous oil revenues, while neglecting basic health and education services for the vast majority of ordinary citizens. Those who commit these abuses are rarely held accountable.
Nigeria’s elections in April - the fourth general elections since the end of military rule 12 years ago - were heralded by many as the country’s fairest. Still, widespread allegations of vote buying, ballot-box stuffing, and inflation of results, most noticeably in rural areas of southeastern Nigeria - President Jonathan’s stronghold - marred these elections, Human Rights Watch said.
Violence linked to the party primaries and campaigns, and on the days of the elections, have left at least 165 people dead since November 2010. Following the April 16 presidential election, protests by opposition supporters in 12 northern states soon degenerated into three days of violent riots and sectarian killings that left hundreds dead, both Christians and Muslims.
On May 11, Jonathan appointed a 22-member panel to investigate the causes and extent of violence linked to the elections. Past administrations have set up similar committees and commissions of inquiry in response to previous outbreaks of communal violence, but the reports are usually shelved and their findings ignored. In Jos and surrounding communities in Plateau State, in north-central Nigeria, at least 1,000 people were killed in communal and sectarian violence in 2010 alone.
“The profound challenges facing Nigeria are, at their heart, human rights problems,” said Corinne Dufka, senior West Africa researcher at Human Rights Watch. “The Jonathan presidency should place human rights, and long overdue reforms, at the top of the administration’s agenda.”
According to the group, Inter-communal, political, and sectarian violence have claimed more than 15,700 lives since Nigeria returned to civilian rule in 1999. Government security forces are widely implicated in serious abuses, including extrajudicial killings and torture. The ruling elite has squandered and siphoned off the nation’s tremendous oil revenues, while neglecting basic health and education services for the vast majority of ordinary citizens. Those who commit these abuses are rarely held accountable.
Nigeria’s elections in April - the fourth general elections since the end of military rule 12 years ago - were heralded by many as the country’s fairest. Still, widespread allegations of vote buying, ballot-box stuffing, and inflation of results, most noticeably in rural areas of southeastern Nigeria - President Jonathan’s stronghold - marred these elections, Human Rights Watch said.
Violence linked to the party primaries and campaigns, and on the days of the elections, have left at least 165 people dead since November 2010. Following the April 16 presidential election, protests by opposition supporters in 12 northern states soon degenerated into three days of violent riots and sectarian killings that left hundreds dead, both Christians and Muslims.
On May 11, Jonathan appointed a 22-member panel to investigate the causes and extent of violence linked to the elections. Past administrations have set up similar committees and commissions of inquiry in response to previous outbreaks of communal violence, but the reports are usually shelved and their findings ignored. In Jos and surrounding communities in Plateau State, in north-central Nigeria, at least 1,000 people were killed in communal and sectarian violence in 2010 alone.
