The International Criminal Court (ICC) which was established under a multilateral treaty called the “Rome Statute” (which was adopted on 17 July 1998 and entered into force on 1 July, 2002) is based in The Hague, Holland. It has 124 members.
Unfortunately, the ICC does not enjoy much support in enlightened circles in Africa. This is because an overwhelming number of the people it has sought to try for “crimes against” humanity” and/or “genocide”, have tended to be Africans. Yet, some of the worst crimes against humanity have been committed by non-African political leaders, especially George W Bush of the USA and Tony Blair of the UK (who used their powerful air forces and ground troops to kill hundreds of thousands of people in Iraq because the two leaders believed – falsely – that Saddam Hussein’s government possessed “weapons of mass destruction”).
While these two walk free (in fact, the US voted AGAINST the very establishment of the ICC!) the ICC’s Prosecutors have, so far, opened investigations into ten situations: the Democratic Republic of the Congo; Uganda; Central African Republic; Darfur, Sudan; Kenya; Libya; Côte d’Ivoire; Mali; and Georgia. As can be seen, nine of the ten countries in which ICC activity has been taking place, are in Africa. The trial processes are at various stages and in the case of Kenya, the charges have been thrown out altogether.
The idea for an ICC had been floated at the UN for quite some time before it was eventually actualised. Even as work was proceeding on the drafting of the Rome Statute establishing the ICC, two temporary bodies with similar aspirations were set up by the United Nations Security Council to deal specifically with the Rwandan Genocide of 1994 (the “International Criminal Tribunal for Rwanda”) and the atrocities that occurred in the former Yugoslavia during the civil war there, following the collapse of communism and the subsequent dismemberment of the country (the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia”) created in 1993. And there has been, outside the ambit of the ICC, a special court on Sierra Leone, which jailed the former Liberian dictator, Charles Taylor, for his part in the atrocities committed in that country during its terrible civil war of the 1990s.
Well, the ICC has now taken a step that will endear the Court to progressive people all over the developing countries. It announced on 15 September 2016 that henceforth, it will be investigating, with a view to prosecuting, “crimes assessed in the light of… the increased vulnerability of victims, the terror subsequently instilled, or the social, economic and environmental damage inflicted on the affected communities.” In this context, the ICC Prosecutor’s Office will give particular consideration to “prosecuting Rome Statute crimes that are committed by means of, or that result in, “the destruction of the environment, the illegal exploitation of natural resources, or the illegal dispossession of land.”
The new ICC attitude has been widely interpreted as a “change of focus” which will enable the Court to expand its remit and “prosecute governments and individuals for environmental crimes such as land-grabs”. (A case had already been lodged with the ICC on behalf of 10 Cambodians alleging mass rights violations by the Cambodian authorities related to land-grabbing.)
Te London Guardian reported that “The UN-backed court, which sits in The Hague, has mostly ruled on cases of genocide and war crimes since it was set up in 2002. It has been criticised for its reluctance to investigate major environmental and cultural crimes, which often happen in peacetime. [But] in a change of focus, the ICC said it would also prioritise crimes that result in the “destruction of the environment”, “exploitation of natural resources” and the “illegal dispossession” of land. It also included an explicit reference to land-grabbing.
The court (which is funded by governments and is regarded as the court of last resort) said it would also now take many crimes that had been traditionally “under-prosecuted” into consideration. The Guardian adds that while the Court is not “formally extending its jurisdiction”, it will henceforth “assess existing offences, such as crimes against humanity, in a broader context.”
The courageous anti-corruption campaign group, Global Witness, commented that land-grabbing had led to many forced evictions, the cultural genocide of indigenous peoples, malnutrition and environmental destruction. “Land-grabbing is no less harmful than war in terms of negative impacts on civilians”, said Alice Harrison, an adviser at Global Witness. “Today’s announcement should send a warning shot to company executives and investors that the environment is no longer their playground.”
The ICC announcement should sound like music in the ears of the Ghana activists grouped, OccupyGhana. The plan to take legal action against the government of Ghana over its unwillingness to end the galamsey menace in Ghana that has already destroyed many of our biggest water bodies, such as the Birem, Ankobra, Prah, Offin, Densu and many smaller rivers like Supong (in my birth-place, Asiakwa in the Easter Region, which we used to fear as children but which has now become a trickle of water covered in green algae in many places).
The government of Ghana initially set up a “Task Force” to evict the Chinese master-minds behind galamsey operators and their Ghanaian collaborators, but the work of the “Task Force” was fatally undermined when the President, Mr John Mahama, himself criticised the “Task Force” publicly for the “brutal manner” the “Task Force” was going about the work of trying to stop galamsey. He said the galamsey operators were just trying to “earn a living”. So the water bodies continue to be destroyed and recently, the water treatment plants in three urban centres were closed down because galamsey had made the water untreatable. These included that of Kyebi, capital of Akyem Abuakwa – one of the cocoa-producing areas of Ghana.
Criminal negligence charges can be brought against the government of Ghana, under the new ICC edict. For in at most five years time, many Ghanaians in the rural areas will have to fee from their birth-places, as their drinking water runs out – the inevitable result of unchecked galamsey operations. What’s happening in our country, it is evident, is no different from the effects of land-grabbing in Brazil or Cambodia.