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New Electoral Commissioner was Prosecution Witness Against Ken Saro-Wiwa ABUJA AUGUST 7th - MOSOP is demanding the replacement of Ignatius Kogbara, an ethnic Ogoni, who has been appointed by the military Provisional Ruling Council as one of 14 members of an "Independent National Electoral Commission". The Commission will oversee plans for a transition to democracy and a restoration of civilian rule in Nigeria by May 1999. According to Nigerian Television Authority reports, the commission will be formally inaugurated at the presidential villa in Abuja this week. Mr. Kogbara was named as a key prosecution witness in the military appointed Ogoni Civil Disturbance Tribunal (OCDT) which tried and murdered Ken Saro-Wiwa and eight other Ogoni leaders in November 1995. At the time of the killings, UK Prime Minister John Major said the 1995 OCDT delivered "a bad verdict, an unjust sentence and now it has been followed by judicial murder". Although Mr. Kogbara did not eventually testify at the 1995 OCDT, key prosecution witnesses directly implicated him in serious allegations of bribery of other witnesses. The legal expert Michael Birnbaum QC - an observer at the tribunal - reported numerous allegations of bribery. Two witnesses - Charles Danwi and Nayone Mkpaa - swore affidavits in early 1995 claiming that they and other witnesses had been bribed to give evidence. Mr. Kogbara and his wife openly campaigned for the 1996 United Nations fact-finding mission on human rights in Nigeria to be barred from Ogoni. Mr. Kogbara is a former High Commissioner to London for the secessionist Biafran government, and is a former senior official of the Shell oil company, based in Port Harcourt, Rivers State. He served in an interim government headed by Chief Shonekan as Industry Secretary, and later was actively involved in General Sani Abacha's discredited `transition to democracy' plans.
"MOSOP is alarmed by this appointment. We had welcomed the military's stated commitment to bring about national reconciliation. Mr. Kogbara's appointment invalidates Military Head of State General Abubakar's clear intention to distance his administration - and bodies overseeing elections - from the record of General Abacha. Based on his record, Mr. Kogbara cannot help to bring about reconciliation in Ogoni. The Ogoni people and other Nigerians will not regard him as impartial in presiding over elections. For there to be free and open elections - and for the Ogoni people to have full confidence in this transition process - the likes of Mr. Kogbara need not be represented in the Independent National Electoral Commission". MOSOP has appealed directly to General Abubakar for a swift end to the crisis in Ogoni. Also appointedon August 7th, Group Captain Samuel Ewang is the new Military Administrator of Rivers State. MOSOP has written directly to Group Captain Ewang, calling for the release of political prisoners and the demilitarisation of Ogoni. (c) Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), 1998. Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), International secretariat: Suite
5, 3 - 4 Albion Place, Galena Road, London W6 0LT, United Kingdom. "Lord take my soul, but the struggle continues" -- Ken Saro-Wiwa, the gallows, November 10th 1995. 'Ogoni is a land of half a million people in the Niger Delta region of Nigeria. Since 1958, oil companies such as Shell have exploited Ogoni's oil wealth, while the Ogoni people have suffered economic deprivation, the environmental devastation of our land and the discriminatory policies of successive Nigerian governments'. 'The Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People demands economic justice, human rights - including the right to choose the use of our land and its resources - and to a future free of violence. MOSOP is the democratic voice of the Ogoni people'. Up to Top HOME | Email Signup | About Us | Contact Us | Terms of Use | © 2008 Sierra Club |
