The International NGO known for its activities in area of sexual reproductive health, Marie Stopes, has on Friday testified before the Special Independent Investigative Panel on Human Rights Violations in Counter Insurgency Operations in the North East with regards to allegation by Reuters news agency the the military conducted 10,000 forceful abortions it fight against Boko Haram insurgents.
The Reuters report alleged that the international NGO was involved in the said abortion saga.
Represented by the Country Representative, Mr Emmanuel Ajah, Marie Stopes, it never engaged illegal abortions but provides post-abortion care and that the Reuters allegation was a pure misrepresentation of facts.
Ajah, said that his organization collaborated with public organisations in the country in the course of their services.
Ajah and Dr Kingsley Odogwu, a Specialist Gynaecologist in thier oral evidence before panel under lead by Justice Abdu Aboki (rtd), said that they only had cases where women who are at risk of losing their lives given medical assistance to save their lives during complicated medical conditions.
There was mild drama during the Friday sitting of the panel when Reuters who had earlier declined to appear before the panel, made an unannounced appearance through a lawyer, Clifford Kalu.
Before Clifford’s unexpected visit to the panel, his client, Reuters, had written to the Commission explaining its inability to honour the summons.
On March 21, 2023, Reuters, through the services of Olumide Babalola chambers, wrote a letter to the Commission titled, “Notice of objection to summons to witnesses dated the 16th day of March 2023 issued on Paul Carsten, Reade Levinson, David Lewis, Libby George, and Christophe Van Der Perre brought pursuant to Section 6 (2)(b) (e) of the National Human Rights Commission Act 2010.
In the letter, Reuters claimed that the witnesses do not have any physical or business presence in Nigeria and, by extension, are outside the territorial jurisdiction of the panel.
The National Human Rights Commission (NHRC) who constituted the investive panel over Reuters report, viewed the the news Agency’s behaviour with suspicion because when a member of the secretariat of the panel asked the lawyer to wait in the waiting room, as the panel cannot have both Reuters and the Army in the hall while the cross-examination of the top military official is going on, the lawyer (Clifford) left, again unannounced, and never came back.
