Torture in Nigeria’s criminal justice system

Director General of Nigeria's National Agency for Food and Drug Administration and Control (NAFDAC) and a pharmacologist by training, Dr. Dora Nkem Akunyili defied death threats while tackling corrupt practices in the manufacturing, import and export of drugs, cosmetics and food products. Taking up her position in April 2001, Dr Akunyili earned nationwide respect for her persistence in prosecuting illegal drug traders and in imposing strict standards on multinational companies. In particular, she pursued manufacturers and importers of counterfeit drugs, deemed to be a leading cause of deaths by stroke and heart failure in Nigeria. Counterfeit drugs worth an estimated US$16 million were confiscated and destroyed by Dr Akunyili and her staff, in the process saving the lives of thousands of innocent Nigerians.

As leader of the CLO (Civil Liberties Organisation), Innocent Chukwuma pioneered a program to publicize human rights abuses committed by the Nigerian police forces. His research exposed an institutionalized culture of brutality and torture in Nigeria’s criminal justice system, which led to the country’s first-ever human rights training workshop aimed at preventing police misconduct. In 1996, Innocent successfully lobbied the United Nations Commission on Human Rights to pass a resolution condemning Nigeria’s human rights record. The move enraged Nigerian authorities, and Innocent began to receive death threats. Undeterred, Innocent dedicated himself to reforming Nigeria’s law enforcement agencies. He founded the Center for Law Enforcement Education (CLEEN), an organization that works both to change police attitudes toward the public and to educate poor Nigerians about their civil rights and the legal system. In addition to his criminal justice work, he was one of the founders of United Action for Democracy, Nigeria’s principal pro-democracy political party. In 1997, Innocent successfully lobbied the United Nations to appoint a special human rights investigator for Nigeria. Today, he continues to be an outspoken critic of political corruption and injustice at home and abroad.is a journalist, publisher and editor in chief of The Sunday Magazine in Lagos. 

Christina Anyanwu was arrested following the publication of an article about an attempted coup against the Nigerian government on March 1, 1995, and was condemned to life imprisonment by a special military tribunal in a trial held behind closed doors on July 4, 1995. Her sentence was commuted to 15 years on October 10, 1995. Her trial was marked by numerous irregularities. She was denied the right of appeal. Christina Anyanwu is one of four journalists held in detention since the attempted coup in her country where infringements of the rights of the journalists and freedom of the press are innumerable.