The Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP) has called on the Nigerian President Goodluck Jonathan to urgently take steps to ensure the decriminalization of nine Ogonis hanged on November 10, 1995 by the government based on a flawed judicial process which had been acknowledged the world over. In a press statement signed by the Chairman of the MOSOP Kingdom Coordinators Forum, the group urges the government to use the occasion of the seventeenth anniversary of the hangings to correct the mistakes of past military regime under General Sani Abacha who executed the nine Ogonis. “The hangings remain fresh in the memory of Ogoni people and lovers of freedom all over the world. We equally know that these hangings were masterminded by the then military government in strong connivance with Shell – a well known enemy of the Ogoni people” the statement reads. The MOSOP statement further notes that a state declaration clearing the name of the “Ogoni 9” and compensating the families could usher in a an era of reconciliation and dialogue on the way forward for the Ogoni problem. The Nigerian government on November 10, 1995 had hanged nine Ogonis condemned by a special military tribunal, headed by Justice Ibrahim Auta, in Port Harcourt with no right of appeal. The hangings was condemned by world leaders including President Bill Clinton and the Commonwealth Heads of Government who were meeting in Auckland, New Zealand at the time. Former Prime Minister of Britain John Major had condemned the killings calling it a judicial murder. Former Nigeria’s Foreign Minister Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi had described the killings as state murder. Source: OgoniNews
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