Nigeria's draconian law against gays has encouraged mob attacks, police torture, evictions and public whippings, according to a report Monday that urges the country's new president to repeal the legislation.
The Same Sex Marriage Prohibition Act is "the constitutionalization of hate and hate crimes against LGBTI individuals," writes Bisi Alimi in the report published by the PEN American Center and the New York-based Leitner Center for International Law and Justice.
It calls for President Muhammadu Buhari to end the legalized discrimination of lesbian, gay, bisexual, trans-gender and intersex minorities, charging it denies them freedom of expression, association, assembly and other rights guaranteed by Nigeria's constitution and international covenants signed by Nigeria.
The act became law here 18 months ago and calls for punishment of up to 14 years in jail for gay marriage and up to 10 years for organizing or belonging to a gay group.
The law makes it a crime to not report a homosexual to police, threatening the families and friends of gays.
Nigerian groups documented 105 human rights violations against gays in the first 12 months after the bill's passage in January 2014, including assaults, mob attacks and blackmail.
In one case, a police officer pretending to be gay joined a group being counseled about AIDS, arrested 38 men there, tortured them into naming dozens of other allegedly gay men, sparking a witch hunt in the northeastern city of Bauchi.
Many gay people fled Bauchi. Other gays who can afford it have left Nigeria.
Eventually, a Shariah court sentenced five men to public whippings where bystanders demanded the death sentence.
Nobody has been tried under the anti-gay law, but it "has given people the right to exercise jungle justice," said Nigerian writer and professor Unoma Azuah, adding that gays "can't go anywhere to seek justice."
AP
Related story: Video - Nigeria's anti-gay law denounced
Tuesday, June 30, 2015
Monday, June 29, 2015
Video - Nigeria parliament fight for vacant leadership positions
Nigeria's lower parliament was thrown into a rowdy session Thursday, after members' disagreements over the selection of principle officers of the House of Representatives.Members of the ruling All Progressives Congress, which is the dominant party in the House exchanged sharp words and some even threw punches, when they could not agree on who should occupy some top leadership positions in the lower parliament.
President Muhammadu Buhari dissolves state oil company board
Inaugurated on May 29, Buhari came to power on an anti-corruption ticket and a pledge to make the sector that provides 80 percent of government revenues more transparent.
"The president has said he will clean up the oil sector. That is the beginning of the clean up," said the president's spokesman Femi Adesina.
Buhari, who has yet to announce his cabinet, is likely to keep the oil portfolio for himself rather than trust others with the lifeblood of Africa's biggest economy and an industry that has long been mired in corruption scandals.
A presidency source who declined to be named said the management team of the state-owned Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was also likely to go in the coming weeks.
"It is significant," Bismarck Rewane, economist and CEO of Lagos consultancy Financial Derivatives. "The whole structure of the NNPC is completely and utterly dysfunctional."
In 2013, then central bank governor Lamido Sanusi said tens of billions of dollars in oil revenues had failed to make it into state coffers while watchdogs say the government may be losing billions more through opaque contracts in which crude oil is swapped for refined imports such as diesel.
The lower house of parliament decided on Wednesday to investigate whether the government had been short-changed by the state oil company scheme to swap crude for the refined products.
Fuel Subsidy next?
"You can't possibly have the same board in place while the place is being investigated and with the intention to change the way things are being done there," said Adesina.
"It's the country's cash cow. It has a bright future. It's just that transparency and accountability have to be introduced into how it operates and this is the beginning of that process."
The NNPC will report to the presidency until a new board is appointed, said Ohi Alegbe, a spokesman for the oil company.
Nigeria's anti-corruption agency has investigated various oil scandals in the past, including a fuel subsidy fraud costing the government $6.8 billion between 2009-2011.
But due to a lack of political will, only a handful were prosecuted.
The president has been advised to end a fuel subsidy programme by a 19-member transition committee formed from his All Progressives Congress (APC), senior party sources have told Reuters.
"The damage NNPC has done to the system, both culturally and economically is significant so it has to be followed up by the removal of subsidies, and restructuring," said Rewane.
Other recommendations include privatising Nigeria's four refineries, which often run below capacity and mean the country imports nearly all the fuel it needs to keep the economy going.
Africa Report
Kidnapped Argentinian released
An Argentinian who was kidnapped by gunmen near a farm where he was working in Nigeria’s Niger state has been released, a police spokesman said on Monday.
Santiago Lopez Menendez was set free by his abductors on Saturday morning, Bala Elkana, police spokesman in the north central state, told AFP by telephone.
Menendez was seized last Wednesday in the town of Machagu as he travelled on the Mokwa to Kontagora road in the west of the state, where there have been previous abductions by criminals.
“He was released by his abductors early Saturday morning. He was hale and hearty when we saw him after his release. He has since returned to his farm,” said Elkana.
The spokesman said he was not aware if any ransom was paid.
Foreigners working on farms and elsewhere in Niger state are normally given police protection but Menendez was travelling alone when he was snatched, state police commissioner Olusola Amore said.
The South American, an agronomist, worked for Nigerian Flour Mills Plc managing two farms in the Sunti and Kabbugi districts of Niger state.
Kidnapping of foreigners for ransom is common in the oil-rich southern part of Nigeria, with victims usually released unharmed once a ransom is paid.
AFP
Related story: Argentinean kidnapped in Lagos, Nigeria
Santiago Lopez Menendez was set free by his abductors on Saturday morning, Bala Elkana, police spokesman in the north central state, told AFP by telephone.
Menendez was seized last Wednesday in the town of Machagu as he travelled on the Mokwa to Kontagora road in the west of the state, where there have been previous abductions by criminals.
“He was released by his abductors early Saturday morning. He was hale and hearty when we saw him after his release. He has since returned to his farm,” said Elkana.
The spokesman said he was not aware if any ransom was paid.
Foreigners working on farms and elsewhere in Niger state are normally given police protection but Menendez was travelling alone when he was snatched, state police commissioner Olusola Amore said.
The South American, an agronomist, worked for Nigerian Flour Mills Plc managing two farms in the Sunti and Kabbugi districts of Niger state.
Kidnapping of foreigners for ransom is common in the oil-rich southern part of Nigeria, with victims usually released unharmed once a ransom is paid.
AFP
Related story: Argentinean kidnapped in Lagos, Nigeria
Nigeria and India to sign prisoner exchange deal
Arrangements are on ground for Nigeria and India are to sign Prisoners Transfer Agreement to allow prisoners of the two countries to return to their home countries to serve their jail terms.
The Indian High Commissioner, Amb. Ajjampur Ghanashyam, who said this while featuring on the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum on Sunday in Abuja, said no fewer than 1,100 Nigerians were serving various prison terms in India.
“When I came to Nigeria, there were about 1,800 Nigerians in our prisons and that was shocking for me and now I am told it is about 1,100.
“We are waiting for an agreement to be signed between India and Nigeria on transfer of sentenced persons.
“They need to be brought back and they can also be taken back to India before commencing their jail terms so that they can serve their sentences here.
“At this is at the moment, pending with the Nigerian government. I hope that we will be able to sign it”, he said.
The Indian envoy also said some Indians had been arrested as pirates, adding that the High Commission was engaging the Nigerian authorities to ensure that the innocent ones among them released.
“We still have some problems with piracy. There are ships operators who hire Indians to run the ships.
“The boys are not aware of that the ships are used for bunkering; they are paid to do a job on the ship.
“So they picked up the job and then land on the ship only for the Navy to come and pick them up and take them to jail.
“You must arrest the owner of the ship, maybe you should arrest the Captain of the ship but not these boys who have no knowledge of what the ship was doing,” he told NAN.
Ghanashyam said Indians living in Nigeria were quite happy adding: “I have not come across Indian who complains but occasionally there are some pockets of kidnappings”.
“But ultimately we have not seen any loss of lives to kidnapping and I believe the situation was much worse before.
“This is because I think the infrastructure of law enforcements in the country is now far better than what it was in the past in Nigeria,” he said.
Daily Post
The Indian High Commissioner, Amb. Ajjampur Ghanashyam, who said this while featuring on the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) Forum on Sunday in Abuja, said no fewer than 1,100 Nigerians were serving various prison terms in India.
“When I came to Nigeria, there were about 1,800 Nigerians in our prisons and that was shocking for me and now I am told it is about 1,100.
“We are waiting for an agreement to be signed between India and Nigeria on transfer of sentenced persons.
“They need to be brought back and they can also be taken back to India before commencing their jail terms so that they can serve their sentences here.
“At this is at the moment, pending with the Nigerian government. I hope that we will be able to sign it”, he said.
The Indian envoy also said some Indians had been arrested as pirates, adding that the High Commission was engaging the Nigerian authorities to ensure that the innocent ones among them released.
“We still have some problems with piracy. There are ships operators who hire Indians to run the ships.
“The boys are not aware of that the ships are used for bunkering; they are paid to do a job on the ship.
“So they picked up the job and then land on the ship only for the Navy to come and pick them up and take them to jail.
“You must arrest the owner of the ship, maybe you should arrest the Captain of the ship but not these boys who have no knowledge of what the ship was doing,” he told NAN.
Ghanashyam said Indians living in Nigeria were quite happy adding: “I have not come across Indian who complains but occasionally there are some pockets of kidnappings”.
“But ultimately we have not seen any loss of lives to kidnapping and I believe the situation was much worse before.
“This is because I think the infrastructure of law enforcements in the country is now far better than what it was in the past in Nigeria,” he said.
Daily Post
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