ECOWAS court orders Nigerian govt to pay N18 million to ladies abused for professedly being whores

The ECOWAS Court on Thursday conveyed its judgment for the situation between Dorothy Njemanze and three others versus the Federal Republic of Nigeria. The case fixated on the vicious, barbarous, brutal, corrupting and prejudicial treatment the offended parties endured because of law implementation specialists in Abuja, Nigeria. 

The ladies by name, Dorothy Njemanze, Edu Okoro, Justina Etim and Amarachi Jessyforth were kidnapped and ambushed sexually, physicaly, verbally and unlawfully kept at various circumstances between January 2011 and March 2013 in the hands of the Abuja Environmental Protection Board, AEPB, and other government organizations, for example, the police and the military. They were captured and blamed for being whores essentially in light of the fact that they were found in the city during the evening. 

In its judgment, the court held that the capture of the offended parties was unlawful and abused the privilege to opportunity of freedom, as the Defendant State had presented no verification that these ladies were without a doubt whores. 

The court additionally found that marking the ladies whores constituted verbal mishandle, which damaged the privilege of these ladies to respect. Further, the court held that the capture disregarded the privilege of these ladies to be free from unfeeling, barbaric or debasing treatment; and furthermore constituted sexual orientation based separation. 

The court found that there were different infringement of articles 1, 2, 3 and 18 (3) of the African Charter on Human and Peoples' Rights; articles 2, 3, 4, 5, 8 and 25 of the Protocol to the African Charter on the Rights of Women in Africa (Maputo Protocol); articles 2, 3, 5 (an) and 15(1) of the Convention on the Elimination of all types of Discrimination against Women (CEDAW); articles 2(1), 3, 7 and 26 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR); articles 10, 12, 13 and 16 of the Convention against Torture (CAT); and articles 1, 2, 5, 7 and 8 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR). 

The first, third and fourth Plaintiffs were each granted harms in the entirety of N6 million. Be that as it may, the case of the second Plaintiff was rejected for being statute banned under the Protocol making the court. 

It must be noticed this is the first run through a global court has articulated on infringement of the Maputo Protocol. 

The case was documented on September 17, 2014 and was a joint activity between Institute for Human Rights and Development in Africa, IHRDA, Alliances for Africa, Nigerian Women Trust Fund and the law office of SPA Ajibade, with help from Open Society Initiative for West Africa, OSIWA.