“unless the judiciary becomes trustworthy and credible as declared in the mission, vision and value statements, the judicial system ceases to be the ultimate shield to protect the society.” Samuel Estifanos
By Samuel Estefanous
(estefanoussamuel@yahoo.com)
I wouldn’t be surprised if the flood of protests being posted online crushes a system like a self-duplicating computer virus. When protest runs wild like this, it breaks all standard procedures set in place to hold a wrongdoer accountable under normal circumstances.
I sympathized with the Association of Judges in Amhara National Regional State but the communiqué? It was better kept amongst themselves than be released to the public with such a plaintive tone. The Regional police knew better, following the release of the said communiqué by the honorable magistrates , it declared that it had done its fair share of ‘the due process’ and washed its hands clean like Pilate did.
On Saturday evening I tried to watch EBS’ late posted online entertainment program and was obliged to log out fast after reading strings of comments soliciting protest from everybody regarding the violation and slaying of the seven years old child by an adult human being in good command of his mental faculties.
Bewuketu Seyoum echoed Ivan Karamazov’s protest against likening scum bugs like the criminal in question to beasts. That would be doing great injustice to beasts as it never occurs to them to do what a monster in human shape does. Bewuketu could have gone further and quoted the elder Karamazov Brother and inquired ‘why should such a man be allowed to live?’
I strongly believe that FYD should be a required reading for law students who are destined to climb the throne of justice without having a ‘good sense’ of it early in their career. Bewuketu knew better.
1-Who gives the law? The Sovereign!
And who is the Sovereign, one naturally inquires. We, the people! Bottomline – law is a means to an end. When it is said that among others criminal law has a deterrence purpose to serve, it is expected to minimize the recurrence of such acts. On the contrary if the trend is showing a marked increase as noted in the latest Amhara and Tigray Regional police reports, the criminal justice administration of the country is failing the Sovereign. In such circumstances it would be an ill-advised venture to lament ‘unbridled protests’ are threats to the independence of the judiciary. I know the first instinct of a judge is to guard the independence of the judiciary, but it shouldn’t be selective. You know what I mean…the major threat to the independence of the judiciary according to the findings of the federal government is corruption.
Let the record show that I am not saying ‘the righteous indignation’ of the judges is totally wrong but it pales beside the rage of the multitude and that there is little wisdom in publicizing it.
I am not speaking in defense of vigilante justice as in the case of Benito Mussolini, Nicolae Ceausescu or Qaddafi. Neither am being an apologetic to lynching. But I cannot rule out the possibility of a Jackie Coogan-like mob taking the law into its hands when regular courts of justices fail to mirror society’s sense and idea of justice by a far wide margin.
We cannot deny that terms like vigilante ritual theory, righteous retribution, watchman’s justice etc. aren’t strangers to criminal law study. Particularly when one is judged by his/her peers- the jury- the defense of righteous retribution occasionally lets a suspect go scot- free.
Now who in his right mind would condemn Ustaz Abubaker for preferring capital punishment for a murderer in his latest article? See, until such time true justice is rendered, we all are bereaved parents burning with rage demanding retributive justice to that unfortunate child.
2-The Brooke Hart Brief
Nothing makes the public sizzle with rage as the concurrent offenses of kidnapping, violating and murder. Increasingly it has become ‘the normal order of the day’ in our country, so much so that the actual victims are being lost in the statistics. Sadly, they have become numbers.
This reminds me of the notorious case of the kidnapping and murder of Brooke Hart and the subsequent legal issues and literary interests it had ignited as ‘the whole of America’- not accepting the then Governor James Rolph- had openly called for vigilante justice. The Governor actually promised to pardon any one person who would kill the murderers, Thurmond and Holmes (incidentally, radio broadcasts and newspapers of the day had characterized the duo as ‘human devils’).
You know what the murders did? They kidnapped the 22 years old Hart and demanded ransom money from his father, when they realized the police were involved they killed Hart and tossed his body into a river. Isn’t this exactly what had happened to Mahlet Teklay of Adwa? At least Hart was a grown up man; here the victims are preteen and teen aged girls for God’s sake.
Holmes and Thurmond were lynched after being dragged out by the mob from prison before any kind of ‘due process was set in motion. I wish they were duly prosecuted and judged by their peers. It is reported that at the last minute Holmes was said to have been screaming his head off ‘you are making a big mistake folks…I am not the man you want!’ What if he wasn’t indeed the man the crowd wanted? Makes one’s blood curl, doesn’t it? See, what the judges meant by ‘due process’.
In part the reason the Brooke Hart case was made famous is, Governor Rolph wasn’t the only high profile ‘underwriter’ of the lynching but artists like Jackie Coogan-the kid in Charlie Chaplin’s The Kid were actually involved in the lynching. To this day, the reasons for the failure of the subsequent prosecution of the lynching party as well as the ‘bravery’ of the two lawyers who had agreed to represent Homes and Thurmond for considerable sum of money are hotly discussed among lawyers.
Bottom-line, unless the judiciary becomes trustworthy and credible as declared in the mission, vision and value statements, the judicial system ceases to be the ultimate shield to protect the society.
Legal issues aside, I have reason to believe that John Steinbeck is a required reading at the Dept. of foreign language studies of AAU, and his short novel inspired by the lynching titled ‘ the lone vigilante’ is very well known among faculty and students alike.
3-The reduced role of the right advocates
Thank God we aren’t in short supply of professional associations and societies swearing in the rights and wellbeing of vulnerable children and women. I have no reason to doubt their noble intentions but little seems to come of their commitment and dedication except the periodic reports produced for the consumption of the donor communities. By the way, I know it is impossible to avoid it but I wish some professionals were to cut down on advancing private interests benefiting from the ‘publicity stunts while it lasts’.
May the Departed Rest in Peace.
God Bless
Editor’s note : Views in the article do not necessarily reflect the views of borkena.com
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The outrage of the people is completely justified, because of the inhuman nature of the crime but mostly because of the treatment that this poor, powerless, single mother faced in the hands of the police and the justice system in general. It showcases the helplessness a woman, a single mother, with no economic power and influence, “cursed” in these ugly times of tribal warfare with a child from a Tigrean man. A “Junta bastard” as I have heard a few people call Heaven.
These attitudes are a direct result of the tribal divisions that run through the country. These last 3 years of civil war have seen hundreds of women been rapped by multiple people, treated as sexual slaves, mutilated and disgraced by barbaric soldiers having their babies torn out of their bellies while alive, been rendered infertile by soldiers that inserted heated metal objects in their vaginas and other medieval, monstrous, dehumanizing tortures. These crimes were committed by all sides. By Eritrean soldiers (that the government invited to help) against Tigrean women. By Federal soldiers against the Tigreans and Amharas , by TPLF soldiers against Amhara women, by OLF against Amhara and by Amhara militias against Tigrean and Oromo women.
I didn’t see much outcry or condemnation then, by everyday people of all (political) colors. I didn’t see the same level of media coverage and rage when they were clearly war crimes and crimes against humanity. Instead many people were screaming that it was western propaganda and fake news to hurt the noble cause of exterminating each other!
Sadly such actions were silenced and covered. Was there any real investigation, prosecutions and punishments ? (I think only 3-4 federal soldiers were accused but I didn’t hear any punishment of them).
It seems that when these monstrosities happen to the “enemy” silence and cover up, protection and dismissal was the norm. Only in barbaric, backwards cultures can sick men get away with such heinous crimes, where women are seen not as human beings, as equals, not revered as givers of life and the backbone of a healthy society but as sexual objects devoid of any human rights, where the rapped woman is shamed and in some cases forced to marry her rapist so that her family can “save face”. Of course the fish smells from the head, so when people of authority use dehumanizing language, starting from the boy king and his generals that used words such as “cancer”,” hyenas and snakes”or “weed that should be uprooted from the (their) land” etc. normal everyday people were silent or even offered justification to these criminals on the basis of “they did this to us, so we are justified to do that to them” when in reality they were talking about their brothers and sisters. Sadly this zero sum game where the winner gets all and the looser losses everything is deeply embedded in the Ethiopian psychic.
Let’s just hope that the horrible death of this child will be the beginning of some change in this medieval mentality where dialogue and mutual compromising is seen as weakness. Let’s pray that more women will find the courage to come forward and share their horror stories and get justice. Let’s pray that the kind hearted police men and women will start changing their attitude towards the victims. That corruption and.bribery will subside and that judiciary system will start fulfilling it’s obligations of protecting the WEAK from the POWERFULL and not vice versa as is the current situation.
RIP young heaven, may your mother find the courage and the support to become an inspiration for other women and get much deserved justice. More than money and water, JUSTICE & ACCOUNTABILITY is what is lacking from the Ethiopian reality…
Ps. Controversial but in any civilized country with a rigid judicial system such as Europe and the US everyone is innocent until PROVEN guilty, keep this on mind and try to refrain from public/on-line courts. Imagine the disgrace, if 1/100000 this man was not the perpetrator… it can happen to you and me to be accused of something, we would want an unbiased and transparent process, right?