Nigeria Owes US No Extradition Obligation
by
I read with utter dismay, a request made last week by the United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. Howard Jetter to the Senior Special Assistant to the President Obasanjo on Drugs and Financial Crimes, Dr. Ibrahim Lame, that Nigeria should extradite about 26 citizens of the country to face criminal allegations against them in the US.
Nothing could be more misleading and insulting than such a request by a diplomat of Jetter's standing in Nigeria's own soil. To say the least, the request by Jetter that Nigeria should extradite its own citizens to US to face charges of drug related crimes, in the simplest terms, means a call for the country to breach standards of international law.
Diplomacy, like Jetter knows too well is predicated on reciprocity, and even if the rule is that of morality, the US, with its reputation of dissidence in international relations does not deserve such 'love thy neighbour more than thyself' gesture from any country, mainly in Africa.
It is annoying that the state of US can brazenly advance such demand to Nigeria when there are a lot of diplomatic and economic evils it has committed or has been committing against Nigeria. USA has unrelentingly been in the habit of sweeping such offences, no matter how grievous under its carpets.
Meanwhile, apart from the fact that Nigeria has no known extradition treaty with US, it is not a rule in international law that a state should extradite its citizens to another country for trial even where a treaty exists.
A principle in international law holds that a state should either prosecute a person reasonably suspected of committing a universal or international crime, or extradite same (aut judicare aut dedere), and the US diplomat who called on Nigeria to send its citizens to his country for trial knows this.
If Jetter and in fact, the United States had any regard for the sovereignty of the nation state of Nigeria as a recognised international personality that is not inferior to it, it should have well adverted its mind to the fact that the request amounted to an insult on the dignity, sovereign and territorial powers of the state, having been made in Nigeria.
It could be understood that drug crimes can arguably not fall into the set of offences that constitute either international crimes or crimes against humanity, safe in situations where they exist treaties among nation states to that effect.
Crimes against humanity include grave offences like genocide, slave trade and human trafficking, gross human right violations such as torture etc.
International crimes are those offences which are agreed to in a treaty, bilaterally or unilaterally as such. Only state parties to such treaty(ies) criminalise them, and at the same time punish or prosecute offenders. At present, Nigeria is not into any known treaty with US to check, combat, or punish offences of drug trafficking, therefore the demand for Nigeria to help US prosecute drug offenders by sending them out for trial does not reasonably and legally arise as a diplomatic or legal obligation.
It will be self-defeating for Nigeria to yield to such callous request by US, mainly when US will be the last country in the world to do any other country such odd favour.
The issue of the pressure mounted on Libya to extradite its citizens for trial by many states of the world including the US over the bombing of a Pan American Airliner in 1988 over Lockerbie in Scotland is still fresh in our minds. The reason for the demand was to some extent justified by many states in the comity of nations. This justification arose from the fact that the offence of terrorism and such destruction of human lives with a reckless abandon was considered a serious threat to the continued peaceful existence of man in today's world. The act was also considered a breach of the provisions of the Montreal and Tokyo treaties on suppression, prevention and punishment of all forms of terrorism and violence against civil aviation.
Moreover, the involved terrorists were not extradited to Scotland, Britain, US or any of the nations whose citizens were involved, but to a neutral state, for trial at the International Court of Justice (ICJ) The gravity of the offence, notwithstanding, it was a matter of serious diplomatic lobby and controversy that lasted many years before Libya yielded to the pressure to release its citizens for the trial.
The government of the United States of America seems to have been getting it over with its alleged spying incursion into China some weeks ago, and maybe, it is time it started another assault on another nation, probably Nigeria.
It does not speak good of a country that regards and arrogates to itself the status of the policeman of the world to trample on the rights and dignity of other nations just because it has power on its side.
If Nigeria, and of course the world should allow USA to be getting away with all these undiplomatic excesses, then the making of laws to regulate the relationship of nations for peaceful co-existence would ultimately amount to waste of time and effort.
The move and demand, coupled with other steps the present Nigerian government has taken calls to serious question, the gamble the holders of the collective sovereign destiny of Nigeria could be playing with its territorial and sovereign integrity.
Last year, there was a reported move by the same USA to establish a secret and intelligence office in the country to check drug and money laundering- related offences purportedly committed by Nigerians against US.
I remember complaining of the dire consequences of the intended act. The government has not refuted or affirmed that allegation, and who knows the number of underground offices the US has been running in the country since the announcement last year.
To further give credence to the illegal and unfriendly incursion US is making into Nigeria's sovereignty, former Chief of Army Staff (COAS), Lt.
Gen. Victor Malu (Rtd) sometime this year warned of the danger of allowing our military outfits to be run and directed at its leadership by US officers and other foreign experts.
In March, the human rights activist and lawyer, Chief Gani Fawehinmi through his party, the National Conscience Party (NCP) raised an alarm over the hijacking of economic advisory positions at the President by non-Nigerians who are mainly Americans, British and Germans. These men are said to be the brain behind the heedless poise by the Federal Government to deregulate the oil sector with a clause of price hike attached.
The alarm indicated that out of eleven economic advisers to the president, nine are non-Nigerians. This is a bad diplomatic trend which will not be a surprise to anybody if the diplomatic adviser to the president is a foreigner of the developed world extraction.
It may be that someone is wrongly advising Nigeria that these moves are the ideal steps towards boosting its international image. This is wrong and in fact an ominous calamity that is staring the nation's diplomatic image in the face. It is a time bomb, and we should expect its detonation any day.
We all kept quiet while a Lagos-based auto dealer was extradited to US sometime late last year to face charges of drug and money laundering.
Ironically, without reference to any bilateral treaty existing between Nigeria and the US, a Court in this land, with due respect, justified the action and the citizen is there in US languishing in jail. While we embarked on this moral diplomacy, a number of US businessmen who duped the Cross River State Government of N48 million in the late 1990s are enjoying their loot in the protection of their home government.
To Jetter, I will only advise that he should tell President George Bush that there are allegedly hundreds of millions of Dollars stolen from government coffers here in Nigeria and deposited in US banks, we want such money repatriated. If US really wants offenders of their drug laws hiding in Nigeria, then it would be a good avenue for us to enter into a treaty of reciprocal repatriations and extradition, and by so doing, we may get our money back, while we hand over the alleged offenders if they are here.
Last year, we had the immediate past US President, Bill Clinton here and we never kept quiet about our demand to have the money stashed in their banks by military looters. While he made promises, he left with our hoes and mats, and till date neither the US Congress nor the presidency has taken any action to help Nigeria get back the money.
Every right-thinking Nigerian should feel absolutely insulted by this demand, and it is a duty incumbent on us to let Jetter and of course Washington know that Nigeria owes US no extradition obligation, mainly of her citizens.