Le 24 juillet dernier Me MArie Thérèse N’Landu a fait un discour devant le parlement anglais. Dans son discours elle remercie cette assemblée pour l’intérêt qu’il a manifesté pour son cas, en votant une résolution demandant au gouvernement congolais de la relâcher. Elle a aussi exposé ses inquiètude vis-à-vis du regime de Kinshasa qui n’a aucun respect pour la justice et le justiciable, qui n’a aucun respect pour la vie humaine et les droits des citoyens. Le discours est en anglais…
UK APPG GL Parliament 24 July 2007, 14-15h
Me Marie-Therese Nlandu’s speech
Mr Chairman, My Lords, Members of Parliament, Ladies and Gentlemen
1.I wanted to meet you to reiterate my thanks made through the press after my acquittal when I passed through Brussels to London .
You cannot imagine the weighty impact your support for Human Rights – expressed in your Early Day Motion with its world wide circulation – had in my release. I might have been condemned to death; I might have been killed without this help. Through, you I thank also the European Parliament which decided to take a resolution on my case. This decision coincided with the day of my acquittal, namely thirtieth of April this year.
Following in your footsteps, the South Korean Parliament wished to do the same. So you were not indifferent to the violations of rights, when I was victimised by the regime emerging from the election.
A regime to which the whole world is looking to build a state of law and democracy. A regime that is destroying itself through massive violations in record time in the sight and hearing of the entire world. A regime that is convinced that the election brings international legitimacy to ruthless slaughter of Congolese people – even in the capital.
2.DESPITE that I am a professional advocate, president of the Congo Peace Party, known as Congo Pax, former candidate to the Presidency of the Republic, announced during the sessions of the Intercongolese dialogue at Sun City in South Africa in two thousand and two,
DESPITE having a well-known family, the Kongo fathers of the independence of the Democratic Republic of the Congo, a known name, a known address, a known behaviour as a defender of Human Rights,
I was arrested without Mr Kabila’s regime taking account of my capacity as a married woman politician in opposition, mother, or even as a potential President of the Republic. If the Congolese had decided to vote for me, I should have become President of the Republic, and never in my capacity as advocate could I have proceeded to the arrest of a candidate colleague in the most arbitrary fashion. But this happened. Do you see signs of democracy or rule of law in such a regime?
In full execution of my profession as advocate I was arrested arbitrarily. It was twenty first of November last year when I was looking for six members of my staff taken away the evening before on twentieth of November, for no apparent reason.
Absence of rule of law is established today in the sight and hearing of all; dictatorship is imposed and the election provides a shield for anti-democracy.
Since my acquittal on thirtieth April the prosecution on twentieth June launched an appeal against acquittal, and in July had a hearing of which I was not informed. The military law provides that the appeal must be made within FIVE days of the acquittal, so the appeal is outside the limit. The authorities are turning to a civil law provision for three months that has nothing to do with my case. Such is the FLEXIBILITY of an administration that does not respect its own laws.
3.At Makala prison where I was taken, I was shut in a padlocked cell with other political women detainees. There was a plan to kill me on the evening of twenty fifth of November. I denounced these threats loudly before all the other detainees of the women’s pavilion nine and the prison director. That night we could not sleep for fear of being taken out in the night. Throughout my imprisonment the nights were doubtful. Many prisoners were taken out during the night and executed. They were mostly executed behind pavilion eleven, according to eye-witnesses.
I ask for an inquiry into the Congo prisons.
I ask for a similar inquiry for Camp Tshatschi where on twenty fourth of March at eleven o’clock in the night, Colonel Bofate proceeded to the execution of fifty-eight Congolese, put in sacks with stones and thrown into the Congo River.
For me, being shut up in a cell full of mosquitoes, alongside stinking lavatories, brought on respiratory infection, malaria and a urinary infection. I was hospitalised in the military hospital against my will, when I was not allowed to consult my own doctor or a civilian hospital. Most fortunately I was well looked after by the medical director, Colonel Kakudji.
I shared my prison life with little girls aged ten and eleven. The ten-year-old had been arrested as a reprisal for her grandmother who had not been able to return the deposit to her tenants. This is a civil rather than a penal matter. The eleven-year-old was arrested because in the house where she worked the wealthy woman proprietor had lost one hundred and fifty dollars. As the child was suspected of theft, she was arrested by a general who went on to violate her. During her incarceration she was bleeding from her sexual organs – because of the violence.
I met a Eugenie Bokolombe, coming from Mr Bemba’s Equateur province, arrested a week after me at Kuilu Ngongo in Bas Congo. She was in a hospital bed, presumed to have taken part in the burning of the Supreme Court, even though she had not set foot in Kinshasa for three years. However her brother worked for Mr Bemba.
Such state terrorism is making Congolese flee their country. Congolese in Britain without papers are threatened with deportation. Congolese in Britain today are taken as real opponents of the Kabila regime. Deporting them to the Congo of today means handing them over to death or arbitrary arrest. As I understand it I escaped death because I was fairly well known.
Who will protect these illustrious UNKNOWN Congolese? Will Britain deport them with everything I have just explained? In the knowledge that she will surrender these defenceless men and women to certain death.
The Congo has known five million dead including relatives of these Congolese facing deportation. Every day, twelve hundred people die in the Congo.
I beg you to sign the Early Day Motion against deportations and removals, as you did for me so that the Government will reconsider the Congo country guidance for Congolese asylum in Britain and find a humanitarian decision.
May I look to you honourable members for the consideration shown to me to be extended to these voiceless so that the Government should not deport them?
Massive violation of Human Rights in the Congo by the special services basically makes Congo a dangerous territory for the Congolese. The killings ordered by the Kabila regime, including some one hundred and fifty persons killed in Bas Congo; unequal disarmament of the vice-presidential guard of Jean-Pierre Bemba. Rape, increasing insecurity provoked by armed bands cannot create a Rule of Law.
We appreciate the organisation of the recent elections in the Congo and they are a benchmark for generations to come. While appreciating the support of the international community, there is a fundamental issue.
In a democracy one accounts for everything. We are asking Mr Kabila to account for the Rule of Law in Congo and Human Rights to the international community on the one hand and to the Congolese people who have a legitimate expectation.
The pillage of Congo’s resources is notorious. If we had good leaders who would develop the country with these resources, the Congo could already have resolved the problem of poverty. The age of abuse of Human Rights to the benefit of multinationals has passed. The interests of the multinationals, the promotion of Human Rights and social security should go together.
In a country, one might call a geological scandal; the population is among the poorest in the world. There is talk of aid to the poor. The Coltan is sold to the sole benefit of the leaders in the regime and the multinationals of neighbouring countries. Some parts of Congolese territory have been occupied by neighbouring countries.
Can Congo expect a debate on this issue to be opened in your parliament? Our parliament can do nothing.
I am ready to answer your questions, and I put three to you:
Are political detainees conceivable in a democracy?
Is democracy conceivable without Human Rights?
Is democracy conceivable without the Rule of Law?
I thank you very much for your time and your kind attention
