#People&039;s Tribunal

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Direct Discrimination: Former Judge Jocelynne Scutt's verdict on the 50swomen pension delay

Direct Discrimination: Former Judge Jocelynne Scutt’s verdict on the 50swomen pension delay

Jocelynne Scutt Some 3.8 million women suffered direct discrimination by the Tory government’s decision in 1995 to raise the pension age, of women to 65 and then 66, MPs and peers will be told at a briefing in Parliament today. This is the main finding of a big report by Jocelynne Scutt, a former Australian judge who served on the Fiji bench and was Tasmania’s first Anti Discrimination…

[annafricatv]

Tribunal Upholds Tinubu's Election Victory As Lagos Senator

Tribunal Upholds Tinubu’s Election Victory As Lagos Senator

In Lagos State, the National Assembly and State Houses of Assembly Elections Petition Tribunal sitting in Ikeja has affirmed the election of Senator Oluremi Tinubu of the All Progressives Congress (APC) for Lagos Central senatorial constituency.

The three-man tribunal led by Justice Kunaza Hamidu in delivering judgment, held that the petition filed by Chief Adesunbo Onitiri of the Peoples…

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Hidden in Plain Sight: Rebecca Gordon on Torture

Hidden in Plain Sight: Rebecca Gordon on Torture

Rebecca Gordon on Torture

Soon after 9/11, the US began holding people in secret prisons around the world in places called “black sites.” Black sites were secret and what happened within them was unknown. When we did learn about the techniques our government was using to extract information, we were told it was not torture but something called “enhanced interrogation.” It sounded new and not so…

[leezloaded]

Tribunal orders INEC To Issue Adeleke Certificate of Return as duly elected Osun Gov.

Tribunal orders INEC To Issue Adeleke Certificate of Return as duly elected Osun Gov.

The Osun State Governorship Election Petition Tribunal sitting in Abuja has ordered INEC to issue Certificate of Return as duly elected governor to Senator Ademola Adeleke, candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party in the 2018 election.

The three-man tribunal upheld the petitions filed by Adeleke and the PDP, challenging the victory of the All Progressives Congress and Gboyega Oyetola at the…

[seachranaidhe]

High Court decision on INM probe due

The case follows a data breach within the firm in 2014 involving 19 people, some of whom were its own journalists The Republic of Ireland’s high court will decide on Monday whether or not to investigate the governance of the country’s largest media group. The move applies to Independent News and Media, which owns newspapers across Ireland, including the Belfast Telegraph. The Office of the…

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A recent ruling by Canada's refugee board makes it harder for Nigerians to be granted asylum, and refugee lawyers are unhappy about how unfair it is.

The Canadian Association of Refugee Lawyers (CARL) is dragging the Canadian government to court over a recent court ruling that will make it hard for Nigerians to be granted asylum in the North American country.

According to a report by New York Times, the association is displeased with the recent decision of Canada's Immigration and Refugee Board (IRB) to establish as a legal precedent its ruling to deny a Nigerian woman's asylum request.

The unnamed Nigerian woman was denied asylum even though she claimed she fled Nigeria to escape the practice of female genital mutilation. The court ruled that she could have sought refuge away from her rural family home in any of Nigeria's large cities of Ibadan or Port Harcourt, and not necessarily run all the way to Canada.

The IRB seized on the ruling to designate it as a "jurisprudential guide" or legal precedent in considering all future Nigerian asylum cases.

According to CARL, this decision is unfair to thousands of Nigerians who make up at least 10,000 of the 30,000 asylum seekers that have illegally walked across the Canada-United States border since January 2017, according to government figures.

The association said the decision means Nigerians would now likely face a higher bar to gain asylum status than they did in the past with their acceptance rate (33% as of June 2018) already below the average (47 %) for all those who crossed the border illegally, according to data from the IRB.

"It's very problematic. It enhances the evidentiary burden on claimants from Nigeria in a way that I say is unfair," Lorne Waldman, an attorney with the association, told Reuters.

According to New York Times, CARL filed a request for a judicial review of the new guideline in federal court in Toronto in July, seeking to block the new evidentiary requirements for Nigerians and migrants from China, India and Pakistan against whom the IRB has made a similar decision.

An IRB spokesperson said the decision was taken to ensure "consistency and efficiency in decision-making" about refugee claims from what she described as a "major source country."

IRB ruling has already affected a Nigerian's asylum claim

The IRB has already enforced the legal precedent to deny Nigerian claimants refugee status, as a tribunal member ruled against granting asylym to a Nigerian man and his family on grounds that there were safe places for them to live in Nigeria.

The man, identified as Samson, said he was a prominent property developer in Nigeria when he began to be targeted by people he suspects to be rival developers.

According to his asylum claims, Samson said he and his family were attacked repeatedly and moving to another city did not deter his detractors. He said this led him to flee with his family to the United States and cross the border into Canada.

"I can't imagine having to go back to a country where our lives are not safe ... They should send me back, but not the kids," he said.

His lawyer, Anne Castagner,is preparing to appeal his case but is equally worried about other upcoming cases in light of the IRB ruling.

"I don't think the real refugees should suffer from the fact that we have a lot of Nigerians coming in," she told New York Times.

Canada working hard to stop illegal Nigerian immigrants

Amid worries at the rise of Nigerian migrants crossing into Canada with refugee claims, it was revealed in May 2018 that the Canadian government was leaning on United States of America's visa officials in Nigeria with the hope of limiting the number of visas issued to Nigerians to move to America.

This measure was taken after the Canadian government noticed a growing trend of asylum seekers illegally walking across the United States of America's border to file refugee claims in Canada. Many of the Nigerian asylum seekers are noted to have arrived bearing valid U.S. visas after having spent very little time in the United States.

A spokeswoman for Immigration, Refugees and Citizenship Canada told Reuters on May 2, 2018, that two Canadian officials were sent to Lagos to work directly with their counterparts in the U.S. visa office.

The Canadian government is under pressure to get the situation under control and is trying to secure its borders more while also obeying its law on refugees and maintaining its image.

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[davidhencke]

High court judgement on 50swomen pension's cannot stand - Jocelynne Scutt tells CEDAW People's Tribunal

High court judgement on 50swomen pension’s cannot stand – Jocelynne Scutt tells CEDAW People’s Tribunal

Dr Jocelynne Scutt The president of the Cedaw People’s Tribunal, and a former judge, Jocelynne Scutt, said today that the decision by the Court of Appeal to turn down the judicial review into the handling of the rise of the pension age for 50s women will be overturned. She was commenting on evidence to the tribunal from Christine Cooper, chair of accounting at Edinburgh Business School on the…

[annafricatv]

Supreme Court Strikes Out Atiku, PDP's Appeal

Supreme Court Strikes Out Atiku, PDP’s Appeal

The Supreme Court has on Tuesday dismissed an appeal by the Peoples Democratic Party and its presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, seeking access to the Independent National Electoral Commission’s sever.

PDP and Atiku had alleged that INEC used the said central server for the collation of results of the 2019 presidential election and that the results from the said server indicated a defeat for…

[davidhencke]

CEDAW People's Tribunal opens with powerful attack on decades of neglect of women's rights and views

CEDAW People’s Tribunal opens with powerful attack on decades of neglect of women’s rights and views

Margaret Owen, first witness at the CEDAW People’s Tribunal A leading women’s human rights barrister yesterday launched a wide ranging attack on the failure of the UK to stamp out discrimination against women -during the 41 years after the UN convention on the elimination of all forms of discrimination against women (CEDAW) was passed. Margaret Owen,-from the National Council of Women founded…

[davidhencke]

Exclusive: London's largest human rights law chambers backs initiative to end all discrimination against women in the UK

Exclusive: London’s largest human rights law chambers backs initiative to end all discrimination against women in the UK

Garden Court Chambers Plans for a People’s Tribunal in London later this year to hear the case for implementing the UN Convention to eliminate all discrimination against women (CEDAW) have received a huge boost after one of London’s leading international law firms have offered to work for them free of charge. Garden Court Chambers, which has 197 barristers and 27 QC’s, and specialises in human…

[davidhencke]

Exclusive: What's missing for women's rights in the UK: Former judge Dr Jocelynne Scutt and former chief prosecutor Nazil Afzal talk about CEDAW

Exclusive: What’s missing for women’s rights in the UK: Former judge Dr Jocelynne Scutt and former chief prosecutor Nazil Afzal talk about CEDAW

Dr Jocelynne Scutt, President of panel of judges of the CEDAW People’s tribunal , Nazir Afzal Legal Consultant to the tribunal Two of the leading people talk in advance of the planned People’s Tribunal in London Later this year there will be a People’s Tribunal in London to evaluate the need for the UN Convention on the elimination of all discrimination against women to be put into domestic…

[davidhencke]

Independent panel of judges announced to head tribunal examining discrimination against women

Independent panel of judges announced to head tribunal examining discrimination against women

Dr Jocelynne Stutt. Pic credit: Cambridge Labour Party The campaign to introduce a comprehensive bill of rights for women by implementing in full the UN Convention for the Elimination of all Discrimination Against Women (CEDAW) takes a major step forward this weekend. Five high profile women -one a former judge – have agreed to serve on the panel which will sift evidence to be presented at the…

[davidhencke]

Top international experts join the People's Tribunal campaign to end discrimination against women and girls

Top international experts join the People’s Tribunal campaign to end discrimination against women and girls

Aim is to write the UN Convention on the Elimination of Discrimination Against Women [CEDAW] into UK domestic law.

Meghan Campbell: Pic credit Birmingham University

Nearly 40 years ago Margaret Thatcher signed the UK up to the UN convention to end all discrmination against women but successive Tory, Labour and coalition governments have never passed the convention in British law.

Now in…

[davidhencke]

CEDAW People's Tribunal: Links for hearing announced

CEDAW People’s Tribunal: Links for hearing announced

The long awaited UN Convention for the Elimination of All Discrimination Against Women People’s Tribunal will take place in London for three days at the end of the month. Here is the announcement:  CEDAW PEOPLE’S TRIBUNAL   You are warmly invited to view the Tribunal Hearings which take place between 9-5pm on these 3 dates:- Monday 21st June  21          View Here Tuesday 22nd June  21     …

[leezloaded]

BREAKING: Tribunal Declares Ademola Adeleke Winner Of Osun Governorship Election

BREAKING: Tribunal Declares Ademola Adeleke Winner Of Osun Governorship Election

The Tribunal made the declaration on Friday after dismissing a preliminary objection against the petition of the PDP and Senator Adeleke, challenging the September 2018 governorship election in the state.

The preliminary objection was filed by the All Progressives Congress (APC) and its candidate in the election, Governor Gboyega Oyetola, as well as the Independent National Electoral Commission…

[newssplashy]

Senate President Bukola Saraki has dumped the APC for the PDP. Here's why.

Senate President Bukola Saraki on Tuesday, July 31, 2018, dumped the All Progressives Congress (APC) for the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP).

Saraki first announced his decision to leave the APC via a Tweet on the evening of Tuesday.

In a statement personally signed by him, Saraki described his exit from the ruling APC as a “difficult decision” he arrived at after extensive consultations with stakeholders.

Pulse lists five reasons why he left the APC for the PDP.

1. No peace in the APC

Saraki alleged that certain forces within the APC prevented true reconciliation of aggrieved members in the ruling party.

“While I take full responsibility for this decision, I will like to emphasise that it is a decision that has been inescapably imposed on me by certain elements and forces within the APC who have ensured that the minimum conditions for peace, cooperation, inclusion and a general sense of belonging did not exist,” Saraki announced.

“They have done everything to ensure that the basic rules of party administration, which should promote harmonious relations among the various elements within the party were blatantly disregarded. All governance principles which were required for a healthy functioning of the party and the government were deliberately violated or undermined.

“And all entreaties for justice, equity and fairness as basic precondition for peace and unity, not only within the party, but also the country at large, were simply ignored, or employed as additional pretext for further exclusion.”

 2. Three years in the APC has not been rosy.

The Senate President accused 'some elements within the APC' of making the party uncomfortable for him and his associates.

Recall that Saraki had battled the Federal Government at the Code of Conduct Tribunal within same period.

He recently won his case of asset declaration at the Supreme Court.

“The experience of my people and associates in the past three years is that they have suffered alienation and have been treated as outsiders in their own party,” Saraki said.

“Thus, many have become disaffected and disenchanted. At the same time, opportunities to seek redress and correct these anomalies were deliberately blocked as a government-within-a-government had formed an impregnable wall and left in the cold, everyone else who was not recognized as ‘one of us’. This is why my people, like all self-respecting people would do, decided to seek accommodation elsewhere,” he added.

 3. Executive/Legislature friction

Saraki noted that the anti-corruption war was being used by the Executive to “silence some members of the Legislature.”

“The framers of our constitution envisage a degree of benign tension among the three arms of government if the principle of checks and balances must continue to serve as the building block of our democracy,” Saraki said.

“In my role as the head of the legislature, and a leader of the party, I have ensured that this necessary tension did not escalate at any time in such a way that it could encumber Executive function or correspondingly, undermine the independence of the legislature.

“Over the years, I have made great efforts in the overall interest of the country, and in spite of my personal predicament, to manage situations that would otherwise have resulted in unsavoury consequences for the government and the administration. My colleagues in the Senate will bear testimony to this.

“However, what we have seen is a situation whereby every dissent from the legislature was framed as an affront on the executive or as part of an agenda to undermine the government itself. The populist notion of anti-corruption became a ready weapon for silencing any form of dissent and for framing even principled objection as ‘corruption fighting back’.

 “Persistent onslaught against the legislature and open incitement of the people against their own representatives became a default argument in defence of any short-coming of the government in a manner that betrays all too easily, a certain contempt for the Constitution itself or even the democracy that it is meant to serve.

“Unfortunately, the self-serving gulf that has been created between the leadership of the two critical arms of government based on distrust and mutual suspicion has made any form of constructive engagement impossible. Therefore, anything short of a slavish surrender in a way that reduces the legislature to a mere rubber stamp would not have been sufficient in procuring the kind of rapprochement that was desired in the interest of all.

“But I have no doubt in my mind, that to surrender this way is to be complicit in the subversion of the institution that remains the very bastion of our democracy. I am a democrat. And I believe that anyone who lays even the most basic claim to being a democrat will not accept peace on those terms; which seeks to compromise the very basis of our existence as the parliament of the people.”

 4. Osinbajo, Oshiomhole tried but…

Saraki who expressed gratitude to Vice President, Yemi Osinbajo and the newly elected chairman of the APC, Adams Oshiomhole, for their efforts in reconciling aggrieved members of the party.

ALSO READ: Kwara Governor dumps APC for PDP

But, the Senate President said their efforts came rather late.  

“The emergence of a new national party executives a few weeks ago held out some hopes, however slender. The new party chairman has swung into action and did his best alongside some of the Governors of APC and His Excellency, the Vice President. I thank them for all their great efforts to save the day and achieve reconciliation. Even though I thought these efforts were coming late in the day, but seeing the genuine commitment of these gentlemen, I began to think that perhaps it was still possible to reconsider the situation.  “However, as I have realized all along, there are some others in the party leadership hierarchy, who did not think dialogue was the way forward and therefore chose to play the fifth columnists. These individuals went to work and ensured that they scuttled the great efforts and the good intentions of these aforementioned leaders of the party. Perhaps, had these divisive forces not thrown the cogs in the wheel at the last minutes, and in a manner that made it impossible to sustain any trust in the process, the story today would have been different.”

5. No change

 Saraki said he was heading back to the PDP due to the lack of justice, equity and inclusion in the APC.

He maintained that the PDP had learnt from its past mistakes and would bounce back even stronger.  

“When we left the PDP to join the then nascent coalition of All Progressives Congress (APC) in 2014, we left in a quest for justice, equity and inclusion; the fundamental principles on which the PDP was originally built but which it had deviated from. We were attracted to the APC by its promise of change. We fought hard along with others and defeated the PDP.  “In retrospect, it is now evident that the PDP has learnt more from its defeat than the APC has learnt from its victory. The PDP that we return to is now a party that has learnt its lessons the hard way and have realized that no member of the party should be taken for granted; a party that has realized that inclusion, justice and equity are basic precondition for peace; a party that has realized that never again can the people of Nigeria be taken for granted.  “I am excited by the new efforts, which seeks to build the reborn PDP on the core principles of promoting democratic values; internal democracy; accountability; inclusion and national competitiveness; genuine commitment to restructuring and devolution of powers; and an abiding belief in zoning of political and elective offices as an inevitable strategy for managing our rich diversity as a people of one great indivisible nation called Nigeria.  “What we have all agreed is that a deep commitment to these ideals were not only a demonstration of our patriotism but also a matter of enlightened self-interest, believing that our very survival as political elites of this country will depend on our ability to earn the trust of our people and in making them believe that, more than anything else, we are committed to serving the people.  “What the experience of the last three years have taught us is that the most important task that we face as a country is how to reunite our people. Never before had so many people in so many parts of our country felt so alienated from their Nigerianness. Therefore, we understand that the greatest task before us is to reunite the county and give everyone a sense of belonging regardless of region or religion,” the Senate President added.

Saraki urged the APC to “respect his choice and understand that even though we will now occupy a different political space, we do not necessarily become enemies unto one another.”

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