Ekweremedu: Transcript of Sentencing Remarks

[Toyin Falola]

[Michael Afolayan]

Wow!

Indeed, as my people would say, "All days belong to the thief, only one matters to the lawful owner." Nemesis must catch up with evildoers. I honestly sympathize with the ailing daughter, and agonize at the parental pain, which this couple must have experienced seeing their daughter at the fringe of losing her battle for life, but you don't earn a break by breaking the law. Harvesting human organs under such horrendously devious channel is a crime against humanity. 

Blessed be the sentence of the Crown!

MOA

On Wednesday, May 10, 2023 at 07:25:29 AM MDT, Toyin Falola <toyin...@austin.utexas.edu> wrote:

 

--
Listserv moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfric...@googlegroups.com
To subscribe to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDial...@googlegroups.com
Current archives at http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
Early archives at http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
---
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "USA Africa Dialogue Series" group.
To unsubscribe from this group and stop receiving emails from it, send an email to usaafricadialo...@googlegroups.com.
To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/DM4PR06MB902446055035A6CD61312631F8779%40DM4PR06MB9024.namprd06.prod.outlook.com.

[Biko Agozino]

Thanks for sharing Toyin.

Mama Guy sentencing, as Trinis would say. He called him a man of good character to hide his erroneous final instructions to the jury when he said that the lies told in court did not mean guilt. The proper instruction is to remind the jury that they were looking at innocent people accused of a crime that must be proven beyond all reasonable doubts. In fact, I discovered in High School when I went to sit in the magistrates court for fun in my village, that the law frowns on the word 'lie', preferring 'it is not true'. The judge misled the jury in my humble opinion.

Turns out that it is not a lie for Africans to call one another brothers, sisters, uncles, aunts, daddy, or mother. Kwame Ture and Harrison pointed this out in Black Power. We are all related by blood. And talking of blood relations, the prosecution abused power by using text messages in which the daughters and their father expressed love for each other on Fathers Day to try and insinuate a criminal conspiracy. Having found the daughter innocent, the parents will likely be freed too if they appeal as I concluded in a blog post.

The Case for the Prosecution of the Ekweremadus? The prosecutor, in the case of the Ekweremadus , opened on February 6, 2023 by saying that the donor must have b...

Besides, if the case was about organ harvesting, why was it not charged under the Organ Donor Act of 2020 rather than the Modern Slavery Act of 2015 which is in conflict because of the inconsistent requirement that even when a traveler is consenting (to be a donor, for instance) it is still a crime if exploitation is suspected? Look at the kettle calling the pot black on exploitation and modern slavery, as if the trans Atlantic slavery was not modern.

Being of the Anglican denomination, Ike is too much of an Anglophile to realize that he has been had by the racist, sexist, imperialist justice system of the UK. He may never appeal but he has strong legal grounds for appeal.

Biko

[Okey Iheduru]

No Nigerian politician [ let alone Nigerian academics!!!] has spoken of the fate of that young man who was trafficked to the UK by Ekweremadu. They are rather all talking about how to get clemency for the former Deputy Senate President. They are concerned about showing solidarity to the man who had every opportunity to build standard hospitals or cause some to be built, but failed to do so.

No agency of government, including NIDCOM or even the Nigerian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has bothered to ask about the welfare of this young man. Where is he staying? What is he doing? How is he feeding?

The Nigerian Senate wrote a letter to the courts handling the matter just to ask for clemency for Ekweremadu. The House of Representatives followed suit. The only argument they advanced was on humanitarian grounds.

Even our beloved Olusegun Obasanjo wrote to appeal on behalf of Ekweremadu, arguing their closeness and the many political positions Ekweremadu had held in the past. But, that son of some poor parents who was obviously working hard to break the cycle of poverty was forgotten.

Our activists and the media don't seem to care much about this young man. They have abandoned him to his fate. If the UK decides to deport him to Nigeria, that's his business.

If this was the son of one Senator or a wealthy Nigerian, all of us would have been falling all over ourselves to speak up for him or to be seen as speaking up for him.

The UK government must be wondering what kind of people we are. What kind of country will forget the most vulnerable of its citizens the way we have abandoned David?

*Author : Onwuasoanya FCC Jones.*

To view this discussion on the web visit https://groups.google.com/d/msgid/usaafricadialogue/868793993.718984.1683729566497%40mail.yahoo.com.