World Rights Day Message Of Intersociety
A Speech Delivered By Emeka Umeagbalasi At The 2013 Anniversary Of The
UDHR (World Rights Day) Organized By Anambra State Branch Of The Civil
Liberties Organization(CLO) Held In Onitsha On 08/12/2013
Topic: Understanding Credible Elections As A Pillar Of Popular Government
& Development: A Case Of Anambra State Of Nigeria
(Onitsha Nigeria, Tuesday, 10th of December, 2013)-On behalf of the
leadership of International Society for Civil Liberties & the Rule of Law,
I pay a sincere tribute to the founding persons of the Universal
Declaration on Human Rights, enacted on 10th day of December, 1948 (65
years ago). The chairperson of the UN 18-member committee of seminal
thinkers that worked tirelessly and produced the all-important global
document; late Mrs. Elizabeth Eleanor Roosevelt, is particularly
remembered today by Intersociety. Also, particularly important and worthy
of mention is one of the great thinkers of the 20th century, Mr. Woodley
Wilson, who was popularly credited as the first international leader to
mention the concept of “human rights” in his famous “14-point program” for
the formation of the League of Nations in 1914. Mr. Woodley Wilson was
then the visionary President of the United States of America.
Though, “human rights” as part of “religious rights” has been in existence
as far back as 304 AD, it became part of Europe and Americas' post
conflict transformation mechanisms starting from the Roman Empire's 30
years civil war of 1618, which ended in 1648 to the 2nd world war of 1939
to 1945. The concept of “human rights” was crudely mentioned in the all
forerunners of the United Nations, starting from “ the Holy Alliance”
(1648-1818), “the Concert of Europe” (1818-1919), to “the League of
Nations” (1919-1945/6). But the concept became seminally pronounced in
Woodley Wilson's 1914 famous 14-point program for the formation of the
League of Nations, finally formed in 1919. The journey to the present day
UDHR being marked in 225 independent countries and occupied territories
around the world actually began in 1941 courtesy of the “Atlantic Charter
of 1941”,issued in August 1941 .
The then leaders of the Great Britain and the United States, Sir Wilson
Churchill and Franklin D. Roosevelt came together and agreed on “human
rights and democratic freedoms” (self determination as a right of the
people and freedom from want and fear). This landmark feat made it
possible for successful convocation of other world leaders' conferences
leading to the historic formation of the UNO on 24th of October, 1945. The
UN Charter was originally signed on 26th June, 1945 by 50 countries
leading to successful lobbying by 40 NGOs in the San Francisco Conference
of same year and time for the internationalization of human rights
including basic freedoms and freedom from want and fear.
After the successful formation of the United Nations in 1945, a body
known as “UN Commission on Human Rights” was set up in 1946 under the
leadership of Mrs. Elizabeth Eleanor Roosevelt with other 17 members.
Mrs. Roosevelt was a well known rights activist and widow of late US
President Franklin D. Roosevelt, who died in 1945. The Committee's
fundamental task was the “definition of human rights and freedoms” within
the contemplation of the UN Charter. Other major contributors to
successful production of this famous document then, who are worthy of
mention today are Rene Cassin (France), Charles Malik (Lebanon), Peng
Chun Chang (China), Herman Santa Cruz (Chile), Alexandre Bogomolov Alexei
Pavlov (USSR/Russia), Lord Dukeston Geoffrey Wilson (United Kingdom),
William Hodgson (Australia) and John Humphrey (Canada). On 10th of
December, 1948 in Palais de Challot, Paris, France, the famous global
document was enacted and signed by over 30 countries present through
their representatives.
The link between human rights and popular polls is strong and a truism.
What credible democracy is to Nigeria is what “truth and reconciliation”
mechanism, which originated from the Southern America, is to the Union of
South Africa. Popular polls and human rights are like biological
encirclement, which goes round without ceasing. Human rights friendly
environment engenders participatory/popular polls, which in turn, produce
popular government and when a government is popularly instituted and
legitimized, human and material development becomes abundant. A government
propelled by popular votes and development has a combination of input and
output legitimacy to its credit. No matter the quantum of physical
development embarked upon by a government, once it lacks popular electoral
foundation, it ends up wearing the toga of mechanical legitimacy. This is
always the fundamental difference between Obi's legitimate government and
Ngige's illegitimate regime in our beloved State. When a government is
popular and development oriented, the masses rejoice and human rights
environment fares better. Illegitimate civilian government founded on
electoral banditry is worst than a military government.
Human rights and credible democracy are inseparable. This explains why the
granting of independence and organization of transitional polls were the
first fallout of the formation of the UN and the enactment of the UDHR in
1945 and 1948 respectively. Following from this was the granting of
independence to India and Pakistan in 1947, Israel 1948, Sudan 1956,
Ghana 1957, Guinea 1958, Nigeria 1960, to mention but a few. Where the
colonial masters refused to grant same, the colonized armed themselves
with “right to self-determination” and fought for their self-governance
until it is achieved. Instances of this abound, Angola to Mozambique;
Zimbabwe to Zambia; and South Africa to Namibia. As the saying goes,
“democracy may be the worst form of government and governance, but the
best form of same has not been found and in absence of this, democracy
remains the best”.
The fundamental question is: what are credible polls? Fundamentally,
credible polls are determined by “living votes” as against “dead votes”.
When people of voting age (18 years and above) who have registered to
vote, file out diligently and submit themselves for accreditation on poll
day arising from the voters' register, after which they queue up and
thumbprint with their fingerprints on valid ballot papers and their votes
counted and entered into result sheets, collated and announced with a
winner and a loser emerging; the aggregate votes of theirs become “living
votes” and the outcomes are called “credible polls”. Any voting process
that falls short of these expressly yields “dead votes”. In determining
the sacredness/sanctity of “living votes”, one thousand “living votes” are
worth more than one million “dead votes”. In law, any poll premised on
“living votes” is beyond judicial revocation. “Living votes” are also
unknown to the axe of the judge's ratio decidendi and long arm of the
“technical justice” in matters of poll litigation.
The governorship poll in our beloved State of Anambra, held on 16th of
November, 2013 and completed on 30th of the same month, may have come and
gone, but lessons arising from it will remain indelible. It was one
election too many. For us in the rights community, it was a test case. It
was a battle of wits between “sedentary rights activists of
Igbo-Southeast” and “pastoral rights activists of Igbo extraction”,
milked and quartered in the Yoruba-Southwest of Lagos Nigeria, who joined
forces with one of the worst opposition political alliances in Africa, in
the name of “revolutionary progressives”. Their so called “poll
monitoring roles” were purely a failed coup and vendetta mission. The
“pastoralists” applied all guerrilla tactics known to them and their
“progressive comradely” political alliance to upturn the sacred political
destiny of the Anambra People including importing and masquerading
thousands of fake ballot papers' thumb printers and when all their
criminal plots got foiled by security agencies, they relocated to the
pages of sectionalized and sensationalized Nigerian Newspapers with
intent to blacken the poll's credibility.
As “sedentary rights activists”, it is our duty not to allow any attempts
to deny our people right to choose their leaders democratically. We must
insist on doing the right thing and ignore “Nigeria's disgusting labeling
culture” of giving a dog a bad name so as to hang it. It is better to be
labeled “a trader” than to be labeled “an armed robber”. Some of these
“comrades of military juntanism” condemned us for choosing decent trade
occupation instead of armed robbery and stealing, yet we put food on
their tables from time to time through comradely begging and assistance.
Some of them asked us for “loans”, given and not given, yet they turned
around and labeled us “mercenaries”, “merchants”, “clowns”, “charlatans”,
etc. If one out of every ten “occupational rights activists” fits into
the labeling above, then nine out of every jobless rights activists are
worst than the former. Our detractor comrades became unsettled when they
noticed that we have transformed ourselves academically and vowed not to
stop until we become doctors of philosophy in ivory towers. Or is it that
university education closed when they graduated? You must always remember
the theory of “Ojukwu versus Gowon”. The theory simply tells us that
there is no lateness in education. Today, it is a case of “Assoc.
Professor” and “parental master's degree holder”.
Fellow Comrades, your contributions towards the all-sector transformation
of our beloved State in the past seven years will forever remain in gold.
Between 2003 and 2006, you fought gallantly for the restoration of the
culture of one person one vote in our dear State and chased away
electoral criminals from the State's corridors of power. In June 2006,
having achieved this great feat, you began the journey for the
transformation of the State through constructive and transformative
partnership with the government you popularly instituted. For “pastoral
Igbo rights activists”, you are “shopping” from the Government of Anambra
State, but for you who wear the shoes and know where they pinch, you see
food but choose to fast for the collective good of our beloved people.
Always remember that criminal government invests heavily on individuals
willing to do its criminal biddings for the purpose of acquiring
mechanical legitimacy, but legitimate government invests hugely on people
from whom its natural legitimacy is derived.
The same political criminal gangsters, chased away years ago from our
beloved State cycled again with utter ferocity and accompanied this time
around by a number of “pastoral Igbo rights activists” so as to take over
our beloved State in a crudest manner, but you fought gallantly and
dwarfed them, by exposing all their reprehensible plots to crown their
candidate next governor of Anambra through “Oshogbo manufactured votes”.
Until they came to our beloved State on a failed civilian coup mission,
they had taken our beloved State to be as socially disastrous as “Oshodi”
and “Ajagunle”. But, their eyes could not believe what they saw on the
ground all over the State. It was a case of supporting a man with “Okada
popularity” against another, whose is predicated on “mass
movement/consciousness”. It is always better to run “government on the
ground” than to run a showbiz or an “owambe” or a media government.
Lastly fellow Comrades, remain resolute and unyielding. Do not see your
choice of occupation as a wrong choice. As human beings, we have three
fundamental tasks on earth: to work, to eat and to render service to
humanity. Occupationally, you must work and eat. Your joining human rights
crusade is not to “eat”, but to render service to humanity. This is why
you should help me spread the message to other comrades including some of
them in Lagos part of the country, “working and eating” with human rights,
which make them willing tools in the hands of Africa's most violent and
militant opposition political alliance, to look for decent jobs or
occupations even if it means being a graduate-hawker. Human rights works
do not belong to “business enterprises”, but “not-for-profit
establishments”.
Starting from my days as your chairman, I have never stopped educating
those of you with limited education to dust yourselves up and head back to
school. This is because as it is difficult asking a brilliant JSS 3
student to go and teach “economics” in the university, so it is, faring
well in the field of rights activism with limited education. Rights
activism comrades with limited education are always known to us as “police
station and libertarian comrades”, while academically grounded rights
activism comrades end up as “egalitarian, formidable and reformative
rights comrades”.
I am happy to announce to you that today my message has turned in about
ten graduates/graduating students including your chairman, who joined
rights activism years ago with WASC. He is now a master's degree student
and reporter with the Sun Newspapers. He told me clearly that it is not
academically over yet until he earns an academic “doctor of philosophy”.
The challenge before us now is to take over the human rights community in
the Southeast and put our detractors out of relevance. We must also
insist on engaging the electoral process, because if we allow political
criminals to take over the polity, anarchy and backwardness will become
the societal norm to be dislodged no more. We must use personal
intellect, ICT resources, volunteerism and in-kind resources to cushion
the effects of declining “dollarization of rights activism” in our
beloved country. This is to ensure that the absence of dollars does not
affect the speed of our rights advocacy works. It will also engender
neutrality and institutionalize human rights with local contents that are
outside the dictates of white man and his dollars.
This Speech Is Pricelessly Dedicated To Late Dr. Nelson Madiba Mandela
(1918-2013).
I Wish His Soul Permanent Peace.
Thank You.
Emeka Umeagbalasi, Board Chairman
International Society for Civil Liberties & the Rule of Law, Onitsha Nigeria
+234(0)8180103912, 8033601078
[email protected]