Maravi

Rupiah and human rights

Rupiah and human rights
By The Post
Tue 10 May 2011, 04:00 CAT

Rupiah Banda says failure to respect citizens’ human rights can result in frustration among the population and lead to great unrest. Rupiah says, “Our country is very special in the sense that it pays special attention to the human rights of its citizens.

What is happening in the world, particularly in North Africa, that once the rights of the people are not taken care of, it results in frustration in the population and causes greater unrest in the country”. These are wonderful speeches about how human rights are being respected by Rupiah and his government.

Should we treat this as simply a good political speech? We know from experience that human rights in this country and particularly under Rupiah’s government have not been respected as well as he claims in his speech. If they were, we wouldn’t have had the riots we had in Mongu and the problems we are facing in Western Province.

Rupiah is very right when he says that failure to respect citizens’ human rights can result in frustration among the population and lead to great unrest. This is exactly what happened in Western Province. Failure to respect the human rights of the people of Western Province resulted in frustration and led to great unrest.

This is a fact that no honest person can deny. Various groupings campaigning for the restoration and honouring of the Barotse Agreement had their fundamental human rights not respected. Despite numerous requests to hold rallies and express and share views on the governance of their area and their country and particularly over the abrogation of the Barotse Agreement by the government of the Republic of Zambia, they were not allowed by the authorities to do so.

We should not forget that inalienable rights include freedom of speech and expression, freedom of assembly and the right to equal protection before the law. We know that these rights are not destroyed when civil society is created, and neither society nor government can remove or alienate them. And since they exist independently of government, these rights cannot be taken away, nor are they subject to the momentary whim of those in government.

We also know that to deny any person their human rights is to challenge their very humanity. And the very humanity of the people of Western Province has been challenged by the government. And what happens when people are denied their human rights, when their very humanity is challenged?

They will certainly resist and fight back. The people will become their own liberators; they will follow the dictates of their conscience irrespective of the consequences which might overtake them for it. The reality is such that for anybody with a conscience, it’s impossible not to defend one’s own humanity.

For as long as people feel marginalised, are not allowed to enjoy their human dignity and have their human rights respected, there will always be tension and conflict. Peace and prosperity, tranquility and security are only possible if these are enjoyed by all without discrimination.

It is said that the great lesson of our time is that no regime can survive if it acts above the heads of the ordinary people.

Rupiah should not give the example of North Africa about what can happen when there is failure to respect citizens’ human rights. The best example Rupiah can give is that of what happened in the Western Province of our country. We cannot ignore or turn a blind eye to our people’s experience of unfairness and injustice.

And we have many cases of serious violations of human rights in this country. For instance, the enjoyment of the right to liberty requires the fair administration of justice in the court of law. We have many of our brothers and sisters who are imprisoned without knowing when their cases will be heard.

In a society that respects human rights, a citizen must have easy access to an independent and impartial court of justice whenever his rights are threatened or violated. The people of Western Province did not have this.

Their rights were being violated with impunity. We saw how they were arrested, charged with treason, driven 600 kilometres away from their villages and brought to Lusaka where most of them had no relatives and no support system. Most of them were tortured in one way or another with no possibility of bringing to account those who tortured them.

We call upon all and particularly those responsible for the administration of justice to ensure not only that procedures are respected but also that impartial judgment is rendered to the accused person.

This will only be possible if the administration of justice is independent of external influence, political or other. But we see how judicial officers are promoted in this country by delivering actions and decisions that advance the interests of the appointing authorities.

have seen even how our Human Rights Commission totally ignored the rights and plight of the Barotse activists and instead chose to defend the interests of those in power, those who appointed them. We see this same behaviour at the Drug Enforcement Commission, the Anti Corruption Commission, the Police and indeed in our entire judicial process.

Those of us who have to pronounce judgment on persons and situations are to view the exercise of their authority as a service of the truth for the common good as well as for the wellbeing of the individual. We appeal to them to be more open to the protection of human dignity. Even worse criminals do not lose their inborn rights.

The right to liberty also extends to political dissidents, to the Barotse activists, to the people calling for a change in a political and economic status quo, to the people who have exposed the problems and maladies in the political and economic arena. An arbitrary imprisonment of such people is a violation of human rights, of their right to liberty. Such political prisoners should be released.

Lives of Barotse activists have been lost in detention because of inhumane treatment. This is a violation of human rights. The right to humane treatment during detention or imprisonment also extends to the political prisoners, to the rioters in Mongu. They all deserve to be treated with respect befitting human beings and in a manner that does not endanger their lives.

This is what Rupiah is forgetting when he is talking about human rights. Rupiah sees the violations of human rights in North Africa as a problem but he does not see his own human rights violations here in the same way.

Violations are violations regardless of where they occur and who perpetrates them. Probably, a precedent must be set by having Rupiah stripped of his immunity and prosecuted for the Mongu deaths after he leaves office. In that way, our politicians may be taught a lesson that the life of every human being in this country deserves respect and protection and no one has the right to recklessly take another’s life.

Labels: HUMAN RIGHTS, RUPIAH BANDA

posted by MrK @ 3:50 PM