Domestication
By Cecilia Ijuo
Abuja, May 21, 2018 (NAN) A Germany-based Non-Governmental Organisation (NGO), Wayamo Foundation, on Monday in Abuja, called for domestication of Rome Statues in Nigeria to complement ongoing fight against terrorism.
The Director of the Foundation, Ms Bettina Ambach, made the call at the beginning of a three-day training Academy for the military, investigators and prosecutors, organised by the foundation in collaboration with Nuremberg Principles Academy, Germany.
The theme of the training is “Strengthening Justice and Accountability in Nigeria”.
Ambach said though the country had made progress in prosecuting terrorism related cases, the domestication of the Rome Statute would give the fight a boost.
“Nigeria in October, last year, started some of the Kainji trials (Boko Haram cases) and I think that is a good sign of trying to address backlog of cases.
“But, Nigeria as a member-country that signed up to the Rome Statute has not domesticated it.
“So, it is a challenging situation where we need to work with Nigerian Criminal Law to address international crimes and that is one of the things we are trying to address here.
“I call for the domestication of the Rome Statute as it will be very helpful for Nigeria.
“We have many incidences where we were talking about international crimes and we were looking for the equivalent in Nigeria’s laws.
“In the process, our training participants said if we will have the tool box of the Rome Statute at our disposal to investigate and prosecute some of these serious crimes it will be better and easier.
“It will help Nigeria to deal with these crimes.
“I hope it will go through Parliament. I do not know exactly where we are but I think it is in the interest of the Nigerian judiciary to have this tool box at their disposal.
“You have signed up, why not use the tool box,” she said.
Ambach assured that the foundation would continue to engage with stakeholders to strengthen capacity to fight crimes.
According to her, we have representatives from the Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC at the training, updating us on where we are in the preliminary examination of the ICC.
“It is important to know where we are and what has to be done to have the assessment in a way that Nigeria can show that it is able and willing to investigate and prosecute alleged potential cases.
“I expect that the complex case group dealing with the complex crimes cases and representatives of the legal services of the army get to know more crimes the ICC is looking at.
“It is also important to know what Nigeria has to do about these alleged crimes,” she said.
The director assured that the foundation would not relent in its effort to assist in strengthening justice and accountability in the country.
She explained that the workshop was the fifth in Nigeria for since December, 2016 for civil and military investigators and prosecutors.
“We are partnering Department of Public Prosecution and the military and we are happy about this relationship of trust.
“We believe that complex investigations regarding international crimes, terrorism-related crimes and transnational crimes need a more intensive collaboration between the investigative arms and the prosecutorial units.”
The Chief State Counsel, Office of the Attorney General of the Federation, Mrs Geraldine Okafor, emphasised the need to domesticate the Rome Statute.
She said efforts to apply the Statute in prosecutorial activities had failed because it had not been domesticated.
Okafor said “the Rome Statute is complimentary to the extent that if there are crimes that the country is not able to prosecute, the international community will come in to prosecute such crimes.
“This is why Wayamo is trying to ensure that Nigeria domesticates it to make it functional and so that ICC can come in to prosecute some of these crimes.
“I know the domestication process has started but it has not been actualised,” she said.
The Rome Statue is the treaty that established the International Criminal Court (ICC).
It was adopted at a diplomatic conference in Rome on July 17, 1998 and entered into force on July 1, 2002.
In October, 2017, 123 states, including Nigeria, were parties to the statute. (NAN)
CJM/OPI/OPI