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Expanding Perspectives on Human
Rights in Africa

This book draws attention to emerging issues around the rights of minorities,
marginalized groups, and persons in Africa. It explores the gaps between human
rights provisions and conditions, showing that although international human rights
principles have been embraced in the continent, various minority groups and mar-
ginalized persons are denied such rights through criminalization and persecution.
African countries have a good record of signing and ratifying international
and regional rights instruments but the political will and capacity for enforcing
these with respect to minorities remain weak. International contributors to the
book provide new perspectives on the rights of marginalized and minority groups
in different parts of Africa and the extent to which they are deprived or denied
entitlement to the universality and equality articulated in law. The authors show
that human rights, while having come of age as a moral ideal, has not been fully
entrenched in practice towards groups such as children, indigenous populations,
the mentally ill, persons with disabilities, and persons with albinism.
This volume is geared toward scholars, students, human rights groups, policy
makers, social workers, international organizations, and policy makers in the fields
of criminology, security studies, development studies, political science, sociology,
children studies, social psychology, international relations, postcolonial studies,
and African Studies.

M. Raymond Izarali is a philosopher and Associate Professor in the Department

of Criminology, Wilfrid Laurier University (Brantford Campus), Canada.

Oliver Masakure is Associate Professor in Business Technology Management

and Human Rights & Human Diversity at Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada.

Bonny Ibhawoh is Professor of History and Global Human Rights at McMaster

University, Canada.
The International Political Economy of New
Regionalisms Series
Series Editor: Timothy M. Shaw

The International Political Economy of New Regionalisms Series presents innovative

analyses of a range of novel regional relations and institutions. Going beyond established,
formal, interstate economic organizations, this essential series provides informed interdis-
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developed by an international editorial team of established and emerging scholars in both
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For more information about this series, please visit: www.routledge.com/The-Interna

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Expanding Perspectives on Human Rights in Africa

Edited by M. Raymond Izarali, Oliver Masakure and Bonny Ibhawoh

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Edited by Li Xing

Multipolarization, South–South Cooperation and the Rise of Regionalism

Efe Can Gürcan
Expanding Perspectives on
Human Rights in Africa

Edited by M. Raymond Izarali,

Oliver Masakure, and Bonny Ibhawoh
First published 2019
by Routledge
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A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library
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Names: Izarali, M. Raymond, editor. | Masakure, Oliver, editor. | Ibhawoh,
Bonny, editor. Title: Expanding perspectives on human rights in Africa/
edited by M. Raymond Izarali, Oliver Masakure and Bonny Ibhawoh.
Description: Abingdon, Oxon; New York, NY: Routledge, 2019. |
Series: The international political economy of new regionalisms
series | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2018054218| ISBN 9781138303768 (hardback) |
ISBN 9780203761762 (ebk.)
Subjects: LCSH: Human rights—Africa. | Minorities—Africa—Social
conditions. | Africa—Social conditions—21st century.
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Contents

List of tables vii

List of contributors viii
Acknowledgements xi

Introduction: conceptualizing human rights issues in Africa 1

M. RAYMOND IZARALI, OLIVER MASAKURE, AND BONNY IBHAWOH

SECTION I
Africa and universal human rights 19

1 Human rights and the politics of regime legitimation in Africa:

from rights commissions to truth commissions 21
BONNY IBHAWOH

2 Human rights in Africa: the African criminal court 39

THOMAS ROSE

SECTION II
Human rights and governance 63

3 Structural inequalities, exclusion, and minorities in Africa 65

OLIVER MASAKURE

4 Old-age poverty, human rights, and social protection for the

elderly in Nigeria 86
OLABANJI AKINOLA

5 Youth movements: emerging actors of the struggles for civil

and political rights in sub-Saharan Africa 103
LAMINE DIALLO AND OUSMANE ALY DIALLO
vi Contents
6 The Sustainable Development Goals as human rights 121
JOANNES PAULUS YIMBESALU AND DAVID ZAKUS

SECTION III
Disability rights 139

7 The United Nations Convention on the Rights of Persons

with Disabilities: historical antecedents and implications for
disability rights and socioeconomic development in Africa 141
JEFF GRISCHOW

8 Persons with albinism: not ghosts, but human beings 158

JEAN BURKE

9 Disability rights are human rights: a situational analysis

of persons with disabilities in Sierra Leone 179
SYLVESTER AMARA LAMIN

10 Mental health inequities in Africa: a human rights perspective 193

CONSOLER TEBOH

SECTION IV
Women’s rights 215

11 Women’s land rights in sub-Saharan Africa: between the law

and cultural norms 217
PAUL D. OCHEJE

12 Women’s rights, food entitlements, and governance in

urban Uganda 234
ANDREA M. BROWN

13 Women’s sexual and reproductive rights in contemporary Africa 251

RAMOLA RAMTOHUL

14 Conclusion: towards an inclusive approach to human rights in

Africa in an age of globalization 268
M. RAYMOND IZARALI

Index 285
Tables

4.1 Population growth of persons 60 years and above in Nigeria

(2006 and 2016) in millions 92
13.1 Poverty indicators for sub-Saharan Africa (2002–2013) 257
13.2 Percentage girls between the ages of 15 and 19 who have
undergone FGM/C 259
13.3 Early marriage in Africa (%) 260
13.4 Maternal mortality by region (deaths per 100,000 live births) 261
13.5 Percentage women subjected to physical/sexual violence in
selected African countries 263
Contributors

Olabanji Akinola is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Algoma

University, Sault Sainte Marie, Ontario, Canada. With regional specializations
in Africa and the global South, his teaching and research interests focus on
topics such as politics, governance, political economy, human rights, social
policy, and global development.
Andrea M. Brown is Associate Professor in Political Science at Wilfrid Laurier
University, Ontario, Canada. Her research focuses on the nexus between
urban food security with sustainable development, gender, and governance,
and the multi-level policy environments supporting anti-poverty measures in
East Africa.
Jean Burke is Senior Lecturer in Social Work at the Australian Catholic
University and a Swahili translator and interpreter. She lived and worked in
Tanzania 1992–2003 and continues to focus her research on human rights
issues in East Africa, including witchcraft beliefs and practices affecting per-
sons with albinism.
Lamine Diallo is Associate Professor in the Department of Leadership at Wilfrid
Laurier University, Ontario, Canada, and one of the founding members of the
Tshepo Institute for the Study of Contemporary Africa in Brantford, Ontario.
Dr. Diallo’s research focuses on leadership, governance, and organizations
with a particular interest in Africa and in academic leadership education.
Ousmane Aly Diallo is a Ph.D. candidate in Global Governance at the Balsillie
School of International Affairs, Wilfrid Laurier University, Ontario, Canada.
His current research focuses on regionalism processes in West Africa/Sahel,
and the relation between alternative orders of governance and effective regional
security governance in Mali and in the Sahel.
Jeff Grischow is Associate Professor of History at Wilfrid Laurier University,
Ontario, Canada. Dr. Grischow’s research and publications focus on the
history and experience of disability in Ghana. His most recent publications
include a chapter in the new Oxford Handbook of Disability History (2018)
entitled “Disability and Work in British West Africa.”
 Contributors  ix
Bonny Ibhawoh is Professor of History and Global Human Rights at McMaster
University, Ontario, Canada. He has taught in universities in Africa, the United
Kingdom, the United States, and Canada. He was previously a Human Rights
Fellow at the Carnegie Council for Ethics and International Affairs, New York,
USA; a Research Fellow at the Danish Institute for Human Rights, Copenhagen,
Denmark; and Associate Member of the Centre for African Studies, School of
Oriental and African Studies (SOAS), University of London, UK. He is the
author of several books and journal articles on African history and politics,
human rights, and imperial history, including Imperialism and Human Rights
(1998); Imperial Justice: Africans in Empire’s Court (2013); and Human
Rights in Africa (2017). He is a member of the College of Scholars of the
Royal Society of Canada.
M. Raymond Izarali is a philosopher and Associate Professor in the Department
of Criminology, Wilfrid Laurier University, Ontario, Canada. He is a Fellow
and former director of the Tshepo Institute for the Study of Contemporary
Africa at the same institution. His research interests include globalization,
global terrorism and security, human rights theory, Africa, the Caribbean,
and South Asia. He has published two co-edited books, The Contemporary
Caribbean: Issues and Challenges (2013) and Security, Education and
Development in Contemporary Africa (Routledge, London, 2017); and a sole
edited book, Crime, Violence and Security in the Caribbean (Routledge, New
York, 2018).
Sylvester Amara Lamin is Assistant Professor in the Department of Social
Work at St. Cloud State University, Minnesota. He earned his Ph.D. and MSW
from The Ohio State University. He is currently pursuing a doctorate degree
in Higher Education Administration at St. Cloud State University. He is a
Licensed Independent Social Worker (L.I.S.W.).
Oliver Masakure is Associate Professor in Business Technology Management.
He holds a joint appointment in the Lazaridis School of Business and Economics
and Human Rights & Human Diversity at Wilfrid Laurier University, Ontario,
Canada. He is a Fellow and former director of the Tshepo Institute for the
Study of Contemporary Africa at the same institution. An applied econo-
mist, his research and publishing focus is on the economics of innovation,
labour economics, and development economics. He previously published a
­co-edited book, Security, Education and Development in Contemporary Africa
(Routledge, London, 2017).
Paul D. Ocheje holds two Masters degrees and a Doctorate in law. He is currently
Professor at the Faculty of Law, University of Windsor, Ontario, Canada. He
also taught at the University of Benin law school, Nigeria, and was state coun-
sel in the Ministry of Justice, Kano State, Nigeria.
Ramola Ramtohul is Senior Lecturer in the Department of Social Studies at the
University of Mauritius. She has published on gender and politics, citizen-
ship, higher education and elite migration in Mauritius. Dr. Ramtohul has
x Contributors
received various research awards and is currently co-editor of the Journal of
Contemporary African Studies.
Thomas Rose holds an LL.M in International Law from Leiden Law School and
a Masters of Studies in Law from Yale Law School. He lectures in law and
human rights at Wilfrid Laurier University, Canada and is a Fellow of the
Tshepo Institute for the Study of Contemporary Africa. His research and writ-
ing focuses on international criminal law and human rights issues.
Consoler Teboh is Associate Professor of Social Work at St. Cloud State
University, Minnesota. He earned his Masters and Ph.D. from the University
of Texas at Arlington. His professional and research interests include social
work policy, mental health, community outreach, immigrant resettlement and
coping, and marginalized populations.
Joannes Paulus Yimbesalu is a Ph.D. student in Health Economics and Policy
at Lancaster University, UK. He is an award-winning youth advocate and a
founding advisor of the Queen’s Commonwealth Trust, which supports young
people across the Commonwealth. He has worked extensively with young peo-
ple globally to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.
David Zakus, BSc, MES, MSc, Ph.D., was most recently Professor of Distinction
in Global Health (Ryerson University), Professor of Preventive Medicine
(University of Alberta) and Associate Professor of Health Policy, Management
and Evaluation (University of Toronto). He has worked in 40+ countries, is
Adjunct Professor of Public Health (University of Toronto) and is Founding
Editor and Publisher of Planetary Health Weekly.
Acknowledgements

We have endeavoured to produce a book that gives voice and attention to

­minorities and marginalized groups and persons across Africa whose human
rights plights are not typically the focus in the literature and public discussion.
We thank all the contributors for their energies toward the production of the book.
We are also very grateful to all the external referees for their anonymous reviews,
and to the review process at Routledge. We also want to acknowledge the research
assistants provided through the Laurier Work Study Program (LWSP) at Wilfrid
Laurier University. The Tshepo Institute for the Study of Contemporary Africa
at Wilfrid Laurier University generously provided a grant for copy-editing and
indexing of the volume, and a grant to Raymond Izarali to conduct research on
human rights in Africa. We are grateful to McMaster University for a research
grant that supported Bonny Ibhawoh’s editorial work on this book. The editors
also acknowledge the support of Rob Sorsby at Routledge and the IPENR Series
Editor, Professor Timothy Shaw.
Introduction
Conceptualizing human rights issues in Africa
M. Raymond Izarali, Oliver Masakure, and
Bonny Ibhawoh

Africa: understanding contemporary realities

Africa is huge and widely diverse. It is also a very complex place. It is complex
because of its turbulent history of colonial exploitation and enslavement, vast
ethnic differences, abject poverty, coupled with wars, insecurity, human rights
abuses, and the rampant corruption of the post-colonial period. Africa’s complexi-
ties also represent promises and opportunities in the bountiful natural resources of
the continent, its rich cultural diversity, and an energetic population of young peo-
ple estimated to be the fastest growing in the world. However, Africa confronts
significant human security and human development challenges that have inhibited
its overall developmental potential. To say the least, state crimes, conventional
crimes, and crimes of globalization and endemic corruption make for significant
human security and human rights concerns, especially in some segments of the
continent. Africa is a large and diverse continent with over one thousand different
linguistic and ethnic groups. This diversity is reflected in the variety of religious
practices in the continent, including Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Hinduism, and
traditional religions/belief systems specific to ethnic groups. Arguably, the peo-
ples of Africa also display the widest difference in physical variation of any con-
tinent on the planet.
While this diversity implies a rich social fabric, it has also been the source
of major internal tension and contestation, borne out of ethnocentrism, racism,
tribalism, classism, and even xenophobia (see King, 2014; Izarali, Masakure, and
Shizha, 2017). In varied ways, this has been evidenced in a number of notable
instances – the 1995 genocide in Rwanda, the apartheid era of South Africa and
southern Africa, and the factions in and eventual collapse of the Somali state.
Such tensions have in many instances played out, most regrettably, in the loss
of lives in significant numbers. Approximately half a million people died in the
Rwandan genocide alone (King, 2014).
In some settings, physical and biological differences make individuals a major
target by the poorly informed practices of witchcraft and so-called “local healers,”
as in the cases of albinos being hacked or kidnapped for their body parts, because
these body parts are thought to yield some supernatural benefits. In yet other con-
texts, racial differences have been the basis of discrimination and human rights
2 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
violations, as in the experiences of black Africans under the apartheid regime in
South Africa and South Asians in Uganda under Idi Amin. While blacks were
excluded from political participation in South Africa because of their race, Idi
Amin expelled the Asian population from the country in the 1970s based on racial
difference. In short, demographic pluralism in African societies should not be
taken to mean cohesiveness.
Beyond this, there are other issues, such as the abuse and treatment of per-
sons with physical and psychological disabilities. Such persons are at times
eschewed or neglected because they are construed as possessed or cursed by
society. Similarly, persons of different sexual orientations are shunned and face
an uphill battle to access public goods, or are at high risk of physical danger
when their sexual orientations are uncovered. The wave of political homophobia
that has recently swept across the continent has intensified discrimination against
people based on their sexual orientation. Issues of refugees and foreign workers
also stir up political tension and controversy. In South Africa in recent times,
there has been an upsurge in xenophobia with resentment toward foreigners from
Zimbabwe and elsewhere on the basis of the perception that they are depriving
South African nationals of employment. This trend is not limited to South Africa.
In some ways it is understandable and not altogether unusual for any society to
be concerned about foreigners or difference, particularly under circumstances of
economic stress and competition for limited employment opportunities. In the
case of South Africa, the turbulent and oppressive history from which it emerged
was such that gaps from decades of under-education amongst a certain segment of
the society urged recruiting people from overseas to fill various professions. One
example is hiring foreign scholars to work in the universities. However, there are
concerns that the state has not done enough to address the inciteful rhetoric and
violence arising from growing xenophobia.
In reflecting on the social fabric of the continent, it is significant to consider
that Africa has a large youth population. Africa’s youth population constituted
19% of the global youth population in 2015, numbering 226 million (UN, 2015).
The United Nations defines youth as people aged 15 to 24 years. By 2030, it is
predicted that the number of youths in Africa will have increased by 42% (UN,
2015). Africa’s population as a whole is very young, with 60% of the entire
continent below the age of 25, thus making it the continent with the young-
est population in the world (UN, 2015). There is contention among critics and
analysts over what this demographic dividend could mean for African nations.
Some believe that with effective governance the economy could significantly
benefit and develop; others have argued that a large, poorly managed youth pop-
ulation may lead to greater instability and civil conflict (AUC/OECD, 2018).
Alongside this is the high level of unemployment among the youth and high level
of informal sector employment; simultaneously, Africa is experiencing fast and
steady economic growth. Africa’s economy grew 4.7% per year between 2000
and 2017, making it the world’s second fastest growing region (AUC/OECD,
2018). Yet, despite the continent’s strong growth, quality jobs remain scarce and
inequality high.
 Introduction 3
The unemployment rate for sub-Saharan Africa is 6%, coupled with high infor-
mal sector employment. When compared to the world average of about 5%, this
rate may not seem that high; however, in most African countries youth unemploy-
ment occurs at a rate more than twice that of adults. Youth account for 60% of all
unemployed Africans. Furthermore, unemployment is significantly higher among
women than men, even if women have equivalent or equal skills and experience
(AUC/OECD, 2018). Thus, there are major issues of equity, and availability and
access to employment. All these have implications for human rights conditions in
the continent. Therefore, it is important that appropriate leadership and prudent
policies are prioritized, so that the plight of the youth and their futures are well
addressed (AUC/OECD, 2018). This is vital when seeking to harness Africa’s
demographic dividend.
A seemingly forgotten or ignored constituency in African societies are the
elderly. As Africa’s population grows, so too does the number of older people
(Cohen and Menken, 2006). Traditionally, extended families have taken care
of elderly family members, but this tradition is now fading. As a result, aging
Africans are facing new problems (Cohen and Menken, 2006). The elderly could
comprise 4.5% of Africa’s population by 2030, and almost 10% by 2050. In some
African countries, the proportion of older people will almost match that of indus-
trialized countries by 2030 and 2050 (Nabalamba and Chikoko, 2011).
Elders have tended to play a vital role in African society, including caring
for orphaned grandchildren and providing much-needed household income
(Nabalamba and Chikoko, 2011; Cohen and Menken, 2006). Yet, in spite of their
contribution to the economy and society, many older people in Africa continue
to experience deepening poverty, discrimination, violence, abuse, and neglect,
and are unable to access entitlements that are theirs by right (Cohen and Menken,
2006). Many older people live in rural areas where there are fewer services. They
experience economic exclusion and are often denied employment and access
to insurance or credit schemes (Cohen and Menken, 2006). Older people also
encounter social exclusion due to age discrimination and changing roles and prac-
tices within the family. At the political level, there is a general lack of will to
deal with the problems facing the elderly (Cohen and Menken, 2006). Because
younger people are more vocal and visible than the elderly, most governments
are focusing on different urgent and pressing demographic problems than the
aging population – among them, rapid population growth, high youth unemploy-
ment, high child and maternal mortality rates, and a growing urban population
(Nabalamba and Chikoko, 2011; Cohen and Menken, 2006). There is a need for
governments to prioritize issues concerning the elderly in their policy planning
through, for example, boosting pension and social protection schemes, target-
ing health care, and supporting community and family care (Nabalamba and
Chikoko, 2011; Cohen and Menken, 2006). The elderly are, after all, full mem-
bers of the society.
Gender empowerment is another significant issue that demands attention.
Africa’s growth and development agenda can only succeed if the continent is able
to draw on all its resources and expertise. The continent’s growth and development
4 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
will depend on the full participation of women in economic, social, and politi-
cal life. While the gender gap remains wide globally, it is even wider in Africa.
The situation is complicated by the fact that the cultural and traditional contexts
are anchored in beliefs, norms, and practices which breed discrimination against
women and feminize poverty. Poverty, discrimination, and lack of opportunity
affect women in multiple ways, not just their level of income. Maternal mortal-
ity rates continue to be extremely high. Although progress has been made on the
education of girls, it still lags behind the education of boys – at all levels. Women
disproportionately suffer from violence during armed conflicts as well as from
violence in the home. Some also endure female circumcision or “female genital
mutilation.” The majority of poor women in Africa live in rural areas. They are
Africa’s major agricultural producers and are productively active in trade and the
informal economy. However, they continue to have fewer economic rights and
lower access to economic opportunities and resources, including land and credit
facilities. Furthermore, women are under-represented in many occupations, espe-
cially in professions such as science and technology. Women, whether formally
employed or not, also shoulder the burden of unpaid activities arising from low
levels of access to clean water and energy sources. Hardship, in other words, plays
out on the lives of women in very deep and major ways. In sum, Africa contin-
ues to face major challenges with far-reaching human rights implication, some of
which may not be readily discernable. Some pertain to visible minorities while
others pertain to non-visible minorities and marginalized groups.
Certainly, weak institutions and lack of good governance are key issues.
Colonialism affected the political, social, and economic history of the African
continent in deep ways. The partition of Africa at the Berlin Conference of 1884–
1885 lead to the establishment of African states as we know them today based on
a combination of violent conquests, negotiations among colonial powers, refer-
ences to geographic features, and a resort to simple geometrical lines. The result
was a creation of boundaries that conveniently and forcibly amalgamated various
culturally distinct and socio-politically and economically divergent pre-colonial
states, while others were divided by arbitrary borders. This undertaking com-
pletely disrupted the autonomous development of pre-colonial societies, depriv-
ing them of their independence, and subjecting them to the authority of an alien
political structure – the colonial state. Some scholars have framed this phase in
the imposition of colonial rule as the process by which Africans were denied en
masse of their collective rights to political self-determination (Ibhawoh, 2018).
This led to the emergence of unequal and discriminatory patterns of relations
between various groups and the state, and among the groups themselves. The
colonial state also, through its divide and rule approach, institutionalized unequal
patterns of relations between members of various groups – between racial and
ethnic groups, and between citizens and subjects (Mamdani, 1996). Moreover,
the nature of the administration of the colonial state, especially its economic pro-
cesses, resulted in the creation of new patterns of inequality among the members
of various ethno-cultural groups – such as through the unequal distribution of
infrastructure, schools, and jobs in colonial administrations. The long-term effects
 Introduction 5
of this situation have been an intensification of rivalry between ethnic regions that
enjoyed advantages through closer contact with Western education, infrastruc-
tural and agricultural development, and those that were neglected.
The postcolonial state saw the entrenchment of unequal patterns of power rela-
tions. As already noted, Africa is unique in its breadth of diversity. In much of
Africa, social and political life revolves around ethnic identities. Despite such
diversity, many African states were not vigilant enough to manage the competing
demands of the constituent ethnic groups. After achieving independence, many
states began to view ethnic diversity as a burden rather than as an opportunity for
nation building. This attitude was further consolidated through the adoption of
liberal constitutionalism that emphasized individual rights, often at the expense of
collective solidarity rights. The postcolonial state essentially perpetuated the ine-
qualities inherited from colonialism. This pattern of state attitude resulted in the
continued monopolization of resources and state institutions by a few or particular
ethnic groups. This in turn meant the marginalization of certain sections of society
by the state machinery, and the spoils of economic developments accentuated the
ethnic fragmentation inherited from colonial rule. In consequence, the undertak-
ing of achieving unity, often accompanied by assimilation of ethnic communities
within the postcolonial artificial borders, became the task of many states. In many
states, this was done at the expense of denigrating the civil, political, linguistic,
cultural, and economic rights of the various ethno-linguistic communities. Apart
from the need to have political influence in the government, the nature of minor-
ity rights issues in Africa are such that minorities need access to resources and to
be involved in the socio-economic framework of the state on fair and equitable
terms. The lack of good governance explains the spate of minority agitations for a
share of political and equitable resource distribution that has resulted in political
crises and conflicts in several African states.
In the aggregate, there are large pockets of marginalized populations across
the continent whose predicaments are deepened by lack of recognition and inat-
tention to their fundamental rights as members of society. In particular, there has
been a blind eye to their human rights. While a considerable amount of work has
been done to advance human rights on the continent, not enough attention has
been given to the rights of minorities and marginalized groups, and to developing
human rights governance. In some sense, it is understandable that these dimen-
sions of society have been neglected because the issues are complex. Minorities
and marginalized groups tend to suffer discrimination and exclusion, in part due
to the historical and political situations underpinning the contexts, nature, and
form of such discrimination and exclusion, which vary from one country or region
to another.
Our aim in this volume is to expand perspectives on human rights in Africa
by responding to the gap in the literature. We focus attention on the emerging
issues of the human rights of minorities, marginalized groups and persons, and
human rights governance. We do so by highlighting the level to which uni-
versal human rights have been embraced by political establishments in Africa
(Corrigan, 2016). We also give attention to the extent to which various minority
6 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
and marginalized groups and persons on the continent are denied rights, either
through criminalization and persecution, or outright deprivation of such rights,
as though those constituents do not matter. Such contexts undermine the moral
worth and development of these persons (Corrigan, 2016; Minority Rights Group
International, 2016).
While expanding human rights protections cannot be the solution to all social
problems, they are fundamental to living a minimally decent and dignified life.
They capture the core elements of human dignity and the basis to flourish as
human beings – the right to life, liberty, and security of person. As such, human
rights principles are invaluable, and their application to different contexts in
Africa is worthy of deeper investigation. Those core elements are especially vital
to people who continue to suffer discrimination – youth, the elderly, those with
albinism and other physical differences, women, and to other variously marginal-
ized groups.

Expanding the perspectives on human rights in Africa

While extant literature has emphasized the importance of contingent factors such
as democracy, good governance, the rule of law, and material resources for human
rights protection, the focus has tended to be on dominant groups and institutions.
As such, it has largely failed to feature the plight of marginalized groups and vari-
ous ethnic and non-ethnic minorities (Minority Rights Group International, 2016).
Minorities – including children, the indigenous, the mentally ill, the disabled,
albinos, Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Queer (LGBTQs), and constituents
with issues related to reproductive rights, right to life-saving medicines, etc. –
continue to suffer extensive human rights abuses, often under the oversight of the
state (Ibhawoh, 2014b).
Although a significant proportion of such violations can be attributed to politi-
cal instability, there is also a general culture of denial with regards to the rights of
minorities, by politicians and the general public. The proliferation of human rights
laws and institutions has not addressed these violations. African countries have
a good record of signing and ratifying international and regional rights instru-
ments such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR), International
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR), International Covenant on
Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR), the Genocide Convention,
Convention on the Elimination of all Forms of Discrimination Against Women
(CEDAW), the Rome Treaty, the Convention Against Torture, the African
Charter on Human and People’s Rights, and the African Charter on the Welfare
and Rights of the Child. While acceding to these human rights principles makes
for good optics, the political will and capacity for enforcement remain weak or
are simply absent (see Corrigan, 2016). This situation impels one to ask: Why is
this so?
Traditional African cultures and religions are often key factors explaining the
persistent violation of the rights of minorities (Minority Rights Group International,
2016). For example, patriarchy is at the root of human rights violations associated
 Introduction 7
with practices such as widowhood rites, female ritual servitude, male preference,
forced feeding, female circumcision or “female genital mutilation,” ritual killing
of both children and adults, child marriages, violence against women and chil-
dren, and wife inheritance (Ibhawoh, 2000; Minority Rights Group International,
2016). As well, many indigenous groups across Africa suffer from forced eviction
from their lands; arbitrary arrests; torture and extra-judicial killings; confiscation
of their livestock; and denial of access to lands, sacred sites, and other natural
resources (Minority Rights Group International, 2016). While homosexuality is
practiced across Africa (see Njeck and Epprecht, 2013), until recently there has
been a rhetoric that homosexuality is “un-African” and this view has fueled the
rise of political homophobia across the continent. This denial, however, under-
pins the persecution of men and women due to their sexual practices and identi-
ties (Njeck and Epprecht, 2013; Epprecht, 2012; Cheney, 2012; Tamale, 2014;
Ilkkarcan, 2015).
Similarly, minority rights are highly controversial in Africa. For indigenous
people, certain ethnic groups, the disabled or differently able, the mentally ill,
or people of different sexual orientation (MSM [men who have sex with men],
WSW [women who have sex with women], and LGBTQ [lesbian, gay, bisexual,
transgender, queer]), risk is inherent in pursuing one’s full range of human rights
from financial costs, stigma, negative political reaction and possibly exile, and
injury and/or death. If national human rights systems are unable to provide protec-
tion, what about the emerging regional human rights protection mechanisms such
as the African Commission on Human and Peoples’ Rights, and the African Court
on Human and Peoples’ Rights? In the absence of state measures that ensure the
empowerment of minority groups (i.e., employment, education, and trust of insti-
tutions of governance), the prospect of attaining rights in a distant continental
court or commission may not be apparent and feasible in practice. Such realities
may undermine human development of particular groups of people who endure
structural and cultural silencing, criminalization, and persecution for difference
from the mainstream or the dominant class in society.
Constitutional human rights guarantees have not always provided the required
safeguards against abuse. In recent years, several African countries have adopted
new constitutions leading to what has been characterized as a “constitutionalism
revival.” From 2000 to 2010 alone, at least ten countries have adopted new con-
stitutions.1 It may be asked: To what extent does this help to promote and protect
the rights of non-dominant groups? Indeed, much of the human rights debate in
Africa has been concerned with the legal, philosophical, and mainstream issues that
are politically attractive and uncontroversial. This volume endeavours to shift the
debate from the mainstream to those who are marginal in society. The volume seeks
to re-conceptualize the human rights discourse from the standpoint of minorities
and the marginalized in Africa, who suffer daily from the actions of mainstream
politicians and ordinary citizens. By insisting on a holistic view that human rights
are as much about economic, social and cultural rights, and civil and political rights
as they are about the rights of minorities and the marginalized, our focus on minori-
ties and the marginalized avoids the current pitfalls of human rights books that tend
8 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
to focus on the mainstream groups. Mainstreaming of minorities in both the debate
and the enforcement of human rights is vital for the peace and stability of the region,
and is thus the backbone of the democratic transformation sweeping across Africa.
We believe, and hope, it will help to curb the cycle of discrimination and margin-
alization of different minorities and marginalized groups. More recently, Africa’s
civil society and think tanks have stressed the urgent need to consider the link
between human rights and governance, as attention shifted from the Millennium
Development Goals (MDGs) to the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (Africa
Civil Society Circle, 2015). A commitment by countries to embed human rights and
good governance in the SDGs framework is important to advancing the rights of
those who currently lack a voice (Africa Civil Society Circle, 2015). This volume
addresses core issues relevant to SDGs as well. It also addresses the role of state
human rights institutions, and the African Court on Human and Peoples Rights.
This book, therefore, provides new insights and perspectives on the rights of
marginalized and minority groups in different parts of Africa, and on the extent
to which they are denied entitlement to the universality and equality articulated
in international and local human rights law. It lays bare the ways in which human
rights, while having come of age as a moral ideal, have not been fully entrenched
in practice in the times in which we live.

Why a human rights focus?

We approach human rights as rights we have, essentially because we are humans
(Orend, 2002). They are a special class of moral rights that carry a high level of
significance (Orend, 2002; Shue, 1980; Gewirth, 1973, 1982). Broadly speaking,
the focus of human rights is to safeguard certain core elements of human dignity
(Howard-Hassmann, 2010; Izarali, 2016; Orend, 2002). As Brian Orend (2002)
notes, from the moral lens it is a matter of treating each person a certain way because
each person has rights by virtue of being human; human rights therefore articulate
a universality of core values about human beings. These rights are outlined in the
United Nations Universal Declaration of Human Rights (UDHR) of 1948 and its
associated international covenants. Their normative relevance and the yearning
for them can be found across cultures, as variously extolled in religious traditions,
poetry, and plain human suffering (Ibhawoh, 2000). Philosophers, sages, religious
teachers, and lay persons alike throughout societies have envisioned or advanced
notions of living well and being able to live a life where one’s dignity and moral
worth are respected and safeguarded. In this regard, rights have relational value
(Ozar, 1986). Rights can be used to make certain normative demands in relation
to other things, such as the right to be free of torture or the right to vote. Rights in
this sense have correlative duties with other rights.

(a) Human rights are claim-rights

Human rights are claim-rights. Jurist Wesley Hohfeld (1978, orig. 1919) distin-
guishes among four classes of rights – liberties, powers, immunities, and claims.
 Introduction 9
Unlike the other classes of rights, claim-rights entail correlative duties on others.
That is, another party or parties have duties toward one’s claim-rights. Claim-
rights are therefore rights to make certain demands of others. Human rights have
correlative duties foremost on the state. In democratic societies, the state is reposed
with a certain degree of authority by civil society to oversee security and stabil-
ity, so that people are not harmed and so that there may be a social environment
hospitable to pursuing lives with dignity and equal opportunity. The state takes on
the larger role as guardian of its citizens and, as such, has authority and obligation
to act in certain ways in the use of force and in the maintenance of security that
individual citizens generally do not (Howard-Hassmann, 2012). Put simply, the
state at face value has a lot of power, and instruments and institutions of power
(Hafner-Burton, 2014). Thus, the state also needs to be kept in check; otherwise,
the misuse of such instruments and institutions of power and control could result
in severe adversity for its citizens. Many African societies have already painstak-
ingly endured such situations with the multitude of coups and mistreatment over
the past several decades, and from the criminal apparatus into which some leaders
transformed their respective states.

(b) Positive and negative rights

Our approach to expanding the discourse on human rights in Africa recognizes the
conceptual and practical distinction between negative rights and positive rights.
The former does not require any active effort by others for one’s right to be exer-
cised, whereas the latter requires active effort and/or resources from others before
one’s right can be exercised. Positive rights include the right to socially provided
education, social assistance for those in need, and public health care. Some pro-
ponents who only consider negative rights as real rights advance a libertarian
ideal. They tend not to consider positive rights as rights at all (see Jan Narveson,
1988; Maurice Cranston, 1962; Robert Nozick, 1974). Others consider positive
rights as vital to enjoying one’s negative rights (see Jack Donnelly, 2002; Brian
Orend, 2002; and Rhoda Howard-Hassmann, 2010). The idea is that if one slips
below a certain threshold in meeting one’s basic needs or that of one’s family; or
lacks the means to develop as a normal human being with basic education and
cognitive skills; and if one does not have alternatives or support mechanisms;
then one’s ability to live a life of dignity and exercise one’s human rights is jeop-
ardized. Thus, if the state has the means to provide such support, then the state
is obliged. An individual’s positive rights impose positive duties on the state. In
effect, positive human rights require the state to furnish the resources to facilitate
the exercise or enjoyment of such rights for its citizens through the provision of
certain social goods.
This tension underpins the classification of human rights at the UN in terms
of “first generation” and “second generation” rights. The former is representative
of civil and political rights, and the latter representative of economic, social and
cultural rights. Certainly, the Cold War era was premised on this demarcation.
The emergence of the two international covenants at the UN – the International
10 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and the International Covenant on
Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights – subsequent to the UDHR in the UN’s
effort to produce something that is legally binding upon signatory states (since the
UDHR is not legally binding) is itself a product of that tension. The UDHR and
these two international covenants comprise what is termed the International Bill
of Rights (Orend, 2002; Howard-Hassmann, 2010, 2012).
We recognize, however, that the UN generations of rights framework has been
criticized for prioritizing civil and political rights over economic and social rights
or collective solidarity rights (Orend, 2002; Howard-Hassmann, 2010). Shaped
by Enlightenment notions of liberal individualism, the twentieth-century crises of
nationalism in Europe, and post-war Great Powers politics, international human
rights as they emerged at the UN came to mean, primarily, individual-centered
civil and political entitlements. However, this ordering of rights was always con-
tested – by socialist arguments for the primacy of economic and social rights, and
by anti-colonial activists in the colonized world who consistently prioritized the
collective solidarity right to self-­determination over all other rights.

(c) Human rights vs. natural rights

The distinction between negative and positive rights has been defined by ongoing
controversy. However, the term “human” in human rights also reflects the evolu-
tion from controversy. Much before the UDHR, the discussion had previously
centered on natural rights stemming from the natural rights tradition, but the term
“natural rights” fueled a controversy about what it actually encompasses. Not
surprisingly, some argued that it essentially extends to non-human lives. Others
took issue with whether such putative rights to humans can be regarded as natural.
That is, they questioned the merit of the claim that we are born with such rights.
The utilitarian thinker Jeremy Bentham (1987) was a fierce critic of the idea that
such rights are innate; he argued that they are not innate but, rather, it was the
case that humans have decided to treat them as innate simply because we regard
them as vital.
This controversy led to a transition from conceptualizing these rights as natu-
ral rights to conceptualizing them as human rights. The objective was to identify
the exclusivity of such rights to human beings and not any other species. Human
beings, after all, are said to be distinguished from other species on the basis of
possessing reason. As a result, we get the notion that human rights are specific to
human beings solely because they are human. Such rights carry significant weight
because of their importance to a life of dignity and the preservation of one’s moral
worth; they are considered vital and prior to all other rights, and as a prerequisite
for human agency or action (Gewirth 1973, 1982).

(d) Cross-culturality
Scholars like Amartya Sen and Charles Taylor claim that normative cross-­cultural
underpinnings of human rights are evident in non-Western ethical traditions
 Introduction 11
(Izarali, 2016; Sen, 2005; Taylor, 1999). In addressing those who see Africa
and other societies as lacking human rights heritage, Bonny Ibhawoh (2001,
p.57) states:

Human rights are the heritage of all mankind and the concept of human rights
has been developed, struggled for and won by different people in different
historical political, social and cultural contexts. There is hardly any basis or
need for the rather sweeping assertions that traditional Africa, or indeed any
pre-modern society for that matter, has made no normative contribution to the
contemporary human rights corpus.

His point is that many of the elements of human rights depict what people in
every society throughout time tend to aspire to or seek in their quest for a life of
dignity and wellbeing, notwithstanding the varied structures or form their respec-
tive societies take. The contributions in this volume are premised implicitly on
the assumption that although cultures and societies may vary, there are certain
underlying core moral elements founded on human dignity that characterize them.
Therefore, it need hardly be said that human rights instruments may be viewed
on one level as capturing certain underlying principles relevant to the human soci-
ety –principles that are manifest in different ways amongst the different cultural
traditions of the word. Of course, there are cultural differences across the human
society as well. At a practical level, it is about imposing particular duties on the
state to facilitate and safeguard certain rights such that individuals may have the
basis to go about their lives safely and autonomously, in an environment that is
free from arbitrary abuse by the state (Izarali, 2016; Howard-Hassmann, 2012;
Shue, 1980). It also implies having recourse to address harms that inhibit one
from living a life of dignity – harms particularly carried out by organs of the state.
It is vital to have recourse through a competent and fair administration of justice
where one is viewed as having equal moral standing before the law. Although the
issue of human rights (especially positive human rights) have been contentiously
debated (see Cranston, 1962; Howard-Hassmann, 2010; Orend, 2002; Shue, 1980;
Narveson, 1988), human rights are a milestone achievement; they are vital for a
life of liberty, dignity, and prosperity when implemented, protected, and enforced.
Human rights protections operate on three levels: international, regional, and
national. While the International Bill of Rights represents the core of interna-
tional human rights protection, national constitutions and bill of rights guarantee
protection at national level. In between international and national protections are
the regional protection mechanisms. There have been significant developments
in the regional legal and policy framework for human rights protection in Africa
within the past three decades. Regional human rights instruments now include
the African Charter on Human and Peoples’ Rights (also known as the Banjul
Charter that the Organization of African Unity adopted in 1981), the Protocol
to the African Charter on the Rights of Women, and the African Charter on the
Rights and Welfare of the Child. There is also the African Court on Human and
Peoples’ Rights, which came into force on 25 January 2004, and has been ratified
12 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
by thirty states as of 2016. Human rights are also featured in the constitutional law
of states, which is essential because it is at this level that human rights actually
operate. These regional instruments have, in some cases, served to complement
national legal and constitutional human rights protections. It is significant that
human rights can also operate at sub-national levels, as in the case of Canada
where there are provincial frameworks of human rights.
International human rights are often framed as universal, inalienable, and inter-
related. In reality, however, states and societies prioritize certain rights over oth-
ers. In some cases, certain rights are not even recognized or enforced. There may
be certain slant toward a particular cultural bias or orientation in facilitating and
enforcing such rights, despite the stipulation outlined in Article 2 of the UDHR
that every person is entitled to the rights and freedoms of the UDHR irrespective
of one’s race, colour, sex, language, religion, political opinion, national or social
origin, birth, or status. Such a slant is evident in some national frameworks where
people of certain sexual orientation are criminalized or excluded, or who are pre-
cluded from access to a certain public resource because of their status or other fac-
tors (Ibhawoh, 2014a; Epprecht, 2012; Cheney, 2012). Similar situations apply to
women, refugee groups, ethnic minorities, and children born outside wedlock in
some parts of the world (Ibhawoh, 2014b; Murray and Wheatley, 2003; Durgaye
and Murungi, 2014). In such situations, dominant cultural or governing players
marginalize and oppress those who do not fall within their line of acceptance. It
is in recognition of such situations in Africa that the present project focuses on
expanding the perspectives of human rights on the continent. It is founded on the
premise that one’s full development as a human person is undermined when one’s
core elements to a life of dignity are deprived or violated.

Existing literature
It is necessary to locate the present volume within the growing landscape of schol-
arship on human rights in Africa, particularly in relation to some recent contribu-
tions by others who have similarly sought to navigate through specific issues and
constituents that have been ignored or not given sufficient attention in scholarship.
Mulugeta Gebrehiwot Berghe’s (2014) edited collection A Delicate Balance: Land
Use, Minority Rights and Social Stability in the Horn of Africa, produced through
the Institute for Peace and Security Studies by Addis Ababa University, focuses
on the rights and livelihoods of pastoralists in the Horn of Africa; it also focuses
on the threats from climate change, land degradation, conflicts, invasive species,
and the extent to which investments in local livelihoods will transform pastoral
livelihoods. The book considers the ways in which investments in agriculture will
play out on socio-political and cultural rights of pastoralist communities, and on
conflict issues in pastoral areas. Ashley Currier’s (2012) Out in Africa: LGBT
Organizing in Namibia and South Africa uses the lens of social movement theory
to examine “how, when, and why” LGBT rights movements in post-apartheid
South Africa and Namibia cultivate intentional public visibility or invisibility
as strategies to achieve LGBT equality. Marc Epprecht’s (2013) Sexuality and
Social Justice in Africa specifically focuses on the history of homosexuality and
 Introduction 13
the current LGBT and HIV/AIDS activism in Africa. It not only considers the
issues of the persecution of people in Africa on the basis of their assumed or
perceived homosexual orientation, but also provides a detailed analysis of the his-
torical factors and external influences that are contributing to the problem of dis-
crimination against sexual minorities. Epprecht thus offers grounds for optimism
in the struggle for sexual rights and justice in Africa, for sexual minorities and
the population at large. Lucie E. White and Jeremy Perelman’s (2010) Stones of
Hope: How African Activists Reclaim Human Rights to Challenge Global Poverty
is a collection that provides detailed pragmatic advocacy for economic and social
rights in Africa. It documents grassroots activists’ struggles for land, housing, and
healthcare, while linking these struggles to broader theories of human rights advo-
cacy. Moreover, it offers case studies in which human rights non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) in Nigeria, South Africa, and Ghana successfully fought
for human rights and social justice. A recent addition to the literature is Bonny
Ibhawoh’s Human Rights in Africa, which offers a broad interpretative history of
human rights in Africa (Ibhawoh, 2018).
These and other recent studies have made commendable efforts to address
human rights in Africa. The issues they focus on, however, are understandably
selective and, in effect, not fully or adequately encompassing of the category and
scope of human rights issues taken up in this volume. They do, however, support
the value and relevance of the volume we have produced.

Organization of the book

This book is organized into four sections. Section 1 is titled “Africa and universal
human rights,” section 2 “Human rights and governance,” section 3 “Disability
rights,” and section 4 “Women’s rights.”
Several chapters in this volume address the gap between state human rights
laws and institutions on the one hand and actual human rights conditions on the
other. As Bonny Ibhawoh’s chapter on human rights and truth commissions, and
Oliver Masakure’s chapter on minority rights show, it is not enough for states to
sign human rights treaties and establish human rights institutions. Human rights
conditions in Africa will improve only when human rights treaties are translated
into policy and action, and when human rights institutions are empowered to fulfil
their mandates of human rights protection. The enactments of human rights legis-
lation, the establishment of national human rights institutions, and the adoption of
international norms do not in themselves convey a commitment to these principles
by governments. We cannot equate the creation of human rights institutions, in
and of themselves, with greater respect for human rights.
Joannes Paulus Yimbesalu and David Zakus examine the sustainable devel-
opment goals from a human rights perspective. Focusing on Africa, they detail
existing socioeconomic inequalities and emphasize the role of youth in both SDG
development and implementation. They emphasize the need for reliable data and
state intervention in the health and education sectors that are cognizant of the
social factors that limit people’s access to health and education. Thomas Rose
addresses the criticism of the African Union’s decision to establish the African
14 M. Raymond Izarali et al.
Criminal Court as a cynical exercise to shield the violators of international crimes
and to undermine the International Criminal Court (ICC) and international law.
He points out that although several obstacles exist that have to be addressed, the
proposed African Court of Justice and Human and Peoples’ Rights, given the
proper support, could become a useful complement to the ICC and contribute to
the advancement of international law; rights can also strengthen Africa’s human
rights regime and by extending rights to all Africans.
In keeping with the book’s focus on marginalized groups who are often left out
in both academic and policy human rights debates, several chapters address issues
of discrimination against marginalized communities. Olabanji Akinola’s chapter
focuses on social protection for the elderly in Nigeria, while Lamine Diallo and
Ousmane Aly Diallo examine youths and their role in the struggles for civil and
political rights in Africa. The chapters by Jeff Grischow and Sylvester Amara
Lamin explore the rights of persons with disabilities; Jean Burke draws attention
to the often-neglected topic of discrimination and violence against persons with
albinism, while Consoler Teboh analyzes the human rights implications of mental
health inequities. What is common to all these chapters is that they highlight the
continuing struggles of these marginalized groups within societies where their
rights have often taken a back seat in discussions about human rights protections,
political inclusion, and socio-economic empowerment. Jean Burke’s chapter is
particularly instructive of the plight of these marginalized groups. Drawing on
media analysis, she shows in detail, the negative depictions of people with albi-
nism and the systemic human rights abuses that they encounter in Tanzania.
Olabanji Akinola makes a similar point in his argument that although govern-
ments have recently made efforts to provide social protection programs for the
elderly in Nigeria, these programs are not based on human rights approaches, leav-
ing the vast majority of elderly persons impoverished and neglected. Similarly,
Grischow shows that although disabled activists have successfully struggled for
the inclusion of disability rights in human rights legislation, the neoliberal con-
text of the rights-based model at the core of the UN Convention on the Rights of
Persons with Disabilities limits the potential for social development and social
emancipation. This gap between human rights promise and reality is also reflected
in the chapter by Diallo and Diallo that explores the struggles of African youth for
political inclusion, democracy, and good governance.
Although women’s rights have been at the forefront of academic and policy
discussions about human rights in Africa, these discussions have not translated
into significant improvement in women’s rights conditions in the continent.
Several chapters in this volume take up the issue of women’s rights from diverse
perspectives. Paul Ocheje’s chapter on the tension between law and patriarchal
cultural norms on questions of women’s land rights offers some hope that law
and the efforts of activist political forces can engender social changes towards
protecting women’s land rights. Andrea Brown’s chapter also strikes a hopeful
note in her examination of the intersection of women’s rights and food security in
urban Uganda from a rights-based governance perspective. She argues that with a
proper understanding of urban food systems, rights governance has the potential
 Introduction 15
to address some of the challenges of both food security and gender. Ramola
Ramtohul’s chapter examines women’s sexual and reproductive rights in con-
temporary Africa. She argues that despite many African countries having ratified
international and regional conventions and treatise that are intended to safeguard
the rights of women in the continent, there is little sign of progress. She attributes
this lack of progress to, among other things, poverty, cultural perception, child
marriage, and fertility control. She argues, furthermore, that the unwillingness of
governments to confront patriarchal and cultural norms in relation to sexual and
reproductive rights of women in the continent is a major contributing factor.
In sum, this volume has examined a number of deep and urgent issues of
human rights of marginalized groups and persons across Africa. Raymond
Izarali’s chapter concludes the volume by emphasizing the value of human rights
in the era of globalization, and why it is vital that there be an inclusive approach
to human rights protection. He points out that globalization raises both challenges
and opportunities, and while human rights respect and protection will not fix all
problems in society, they will serve well to mitigate the harms of globalization
and empower people with the basis to live a life of dignity and human flourishing.
But this, he contends, requires an approach where everyone’s human rights are
respected and protected, and thus safeguarded from cultural stigma, state breaches
and nepotism of policy makers.
It is our hope that the human rights issues examined in this volume and the
suggestions offered in the respective chapters will bear fruit for the lives of the
variously marginalized groups and persons across Africa, so they can live a life
of dignity and be able to flourish. We hope we have given voice to the suffering
endured by those who lack the means or reach to do so on their own. We hope,
too, that others who are capable of doing so will continue this undertaking by
developing the research further and deeper, to produce a wider, and even better,
account of the human rights plight of those who are marginalized in the continent
– one that resonates with Nelson Mandela’s vision of an Africa that is seen first
for its humanity.

Note
1 These include: Côte d’Ivoire (2000), Comoros (2001), Congo (2002), Rwanda (2003),
Somalia (Transitional Charter 2004), Burundi (2004), Mozambique (2004), Sudan
(2005), Swaziland (2006), Democratic Republic of Congo (2006), and Kenya (2010).

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Section I

Africa and universal

human rights
1 Human rights and the politics
of regime legitimation in Africa
From rights commissions to
truth commissions
Bonny Ibhawoh

Introduction
Human rights have become the new political ideology. In the post-Cold War world,
human rights have become the most powerful creed for political legitimation.
Along with rhetorical assertions of the state’s commitment to human rights princi-
ples, the establishment of national human rights institutions (NHRI) and truth com-
missions have become the means by which governments seek to legitimize power
and gain credibility at home and abroad. Even the most repressive regimes learn
quickly that by publicly pledging commitment to human rights and establishing
human rights institutions, they can gain some validation within the international
community. The proliferation of national human rights institutions across Africa
in the 1990s started a trend in statist appropriation of human rights discourse for
political legitimation and has continued with the spread of truth commissions.
Despite their popularity across the continent, national human rights com-
missions that were created to promote human rights, have not lived up to their
mandates of protecting the rights of citizens or holding governments accountable
for abuses. Similarly, truth commissions that were created to investigate human
rights violations, bring justice to victims, and foster national reconciliation in
the aftermath of conflict, have not always been effective mechanisms for human
rights accountability, victim-centered justice, or national reconciliation. It raises
the question of why, despite their limitations, these institutions have proliferated
across the continent.
In this chapter, I argue that the proliferation of national human rights commis-
sions and truth commissions represents an emerging global trend in statist appro-
priation of human rights discourse for regime legitimation. Just as governments
in Africa and elsewhere strategically used Cold-War ideological alliance with
Western and Eastern bloc powers as an instrumental basis to legitimize political
power, so too have human rights become a means of asserting political legitimacy
in an uncertain unipolar world. African ruling elites that are jostling for power
have learned that old ideologies of Marxism, socialism, and liberal capitalism
no longer confer political legitimacy. Instead, the language of human rights now
provides the most effective means of rallying domestic support and gaining inter-
national acceptance.
22 Bonny Ibhawoh
Paradoxically, the language of human rights has also proved to be an effective
means of challenging the legitimacy of rulers and governments. In the post-Cold
War world, the most effective way to undermine political opponents is to accuse
them of being human rights violators, as opposed to labeling them as communist
autocrats or capitalist oppressors. Autocrats and dictators justify the overthrow of
elected governments and the usurpation of political power with hollow pledges
of human rights reforms. Authoritarian regimes strategically profess commitment
to human rights even as they resist calls for political liberalization and hold on to
power through repressive policies. For some ruling elites in Africa as elsewhere,
the appeal of human rights has more to do with political legitimation than civil lib-
erties or socio-economic empowerment. The seeming ascendency of human rights
talk in the corridors of power in Africa therefore calls for critical assessment.

Legitimizing power through human rights talk

After his election as president of Liberia in 1997 following a brutal civil war, one
of the first announcements made by the former factional warlord Charles Taylor
was that he would establish a national human rights commission. The protec-
tion of human rights, Taylor proclaimed, would be the guiding principle of his
government and would mark a break from the atrocities and abuses of the past.
Taylor’s pledge to uphold human rights came amidst domestic opposition to his
government and international pressure for accountability for his own war crimes.
Taylor’s government functioned without accountability and exacerbated the divi-
sions and resentments fueled by the war. His security agents allegedly engaged in
threats, intimidation, arbitrary arrests, and political assignations (Onwumechili,
1998, p. 29). State power was regularly misused to further parochial political
objectives, to avoid accountability, and for personal enrichment. State institutions
that could have provided an independent check on the Taylor administration –
such as the judiciary, the legislature, and the human rights commission – were
harassed and intimidated. Independent voices in the media and the human rights
community were steadily silenced (Amnesty International, 2012).
The Human Rights Commission Taylor’s government established with great
fanfare was placed under tight government control. Although it comprised rep-
resentatives from non-governmental organizations, groups that had spoken out
against the abuses by Taylor’s forces were excluded (Armstrong, 2006, p. 187).
The Commission suffered from a lack of qualified personnel, inadequate funding,
and a flawed mandate (Human Rights Watch, 2002). It was clearly evident that
Taylor was no human rights champion. Taylor and his ministers accused human
rights groups of promoting publicity that was detrimental to the economy. The
government also accused human rights groups of publicizing human rights abuses
that resulted in the withholding of international financial aid. Non-governmental
organization personnel faced constant intimidation by security forces (Armstrong,
2006, p. 187).
Throughout Taylor’s six-year rule, the Human Rights Commission was largely
ineffective, paralyzed by the government through its flawed legislation, inadequate
 The politics of regime legitimation in Africa 23
funding, and political pressure. One nominated human rights commissioner fled
the country, stating that he feared for his life after his detention and beating by the
police (Human Rights Watch, 1999). Despite its deplorable human rights record,
Taylor’s government, in its desperation for domestic acceptance and international
legitimacy, touted its commitment to human rights, holding up as evidence, the
establishment of a national human rights commission. Taylor would be ultimately
deposed, tried, and convicted by an international court for what the presiding
Judge described as “some of the most heinous and brutal crimes recorded in
human history” (Jalloh and Meisenberg 2012, p. 4060).
The establishment of national human rights commissions in several African
countries was driven by similar political considerations. The governments of
President Daniel arap Moi in Kenya, General Sani Abacha in Nigeria, Paul Biya
in Cameroon, and Gnassingbe Eyadema in Togo, all created human rights insti-
tutions at moments of national political crisis with the principal aim of deflect-
ing criticism of their human rights record. None of the human rights institutions
established by these governments seriously addressed politically charged human
rights issues (Nowrojee, 2001, p. 26). In Morocco, Tunisia, and Algeria, the main
impetus for the establishment of human rights institutions in the 1990s were inter-
nal developments linked to the growing strength of Islamist political activity. In
the wake of government crackdowns against Islamist opposition movements,
international criticism of state repression, and widespread human rights abuses,
institutions were created to show a commitment to democracy and human rights
even as state repression persisted (Murray, 2007, p. 14).
From these examples, one can delineate a pattern in the use of human rights
talk for regime legitimation. Amidst growing public awareness of universal
human rights, and demands by citizens that these rights be protected, repressive
regimes in Africa as elsewhere have sought to legitimize their rule by paying lip
service to human rights. From Liberia’s Charles Taylor to Cameroon’s Paul Biya,
the dubious invocations of human rights by authoritarian African rulers reflect
an emerging trend in the instrumentalization of human rights to legitimize their
governments and consolidate political power. This trend which began with the
proliferation of national human rights institutions in the 1990s has expanded with
the establishment of truth and reconciliation commissions (TRCs) with mandates
to investigate human rights abuses and foster national reconciliation in the after-
math of conflict.
National truth commissions that have proliferated in the continent since the
creation of the South African TRC have also served as instruments of politi-
cal legitimacy for ruling regimes. Beyond their mandates of truth-finding and
national reconciliation, governments have deployed truth commissions to serve
partisan political agendas. Truth commissions established by newly elected gov-
ernments in Nigeria, Ghana, and Kenya as part of democratic transition programs
or post-conflict peacebuilding processes have been criticized for targeting politi-
cal opponents rather than objectively investigating human rights abuses or fos-
tering national healing (Asare, 2018; Perry and Sayndee, 2015; Lynch, 2018;
Slye, 2018). In Ghana for example, the creation of the National Reconciliation
24 Bonny Ibhawoh
Commission was part of the competition between the ruling New Patriotic Party
(NPP) and the previous government of the National Democratic Congress (NDC)
(Asare, 2018, p. 37). In Nigeria, the government of Olusegun Obasanjo which
established a truth commission with great fanfare in 1999, abruptly annulled the
commission and suppressed its report which indicted the military and influential
politicians in the government for human rights abuses. The growing popularity
of truth commissions may be attributed as much to their utility as instruments
for political legitimation than as to their value as mechanisms for human rights
accountability and post-conflict peacebuilding.

National human rights commissions

The end of the Cold War raised questions about the viability of the international
state system plunging the world into crises of sovereignty and statehood. The
crisis of statehood was most keenly felt in Africa. Despite attempts at democra-
tization, this crisis was evident in weakened and fragile states, corrupt and dic-
tatorial elites, disruptive militaries, ethnic tensions, and economic decline. The
collapse of the Soviet Union and several other formerly communist European
states foreshadowed similar state collapse in Africa including in Sierra Leone,
Liberia, Somalia, and Rwanda (Mutua, 1995). Coinciding with the end of the
Cold War, the 1990s also was a period of proliferation of national human rights
institutions across Africa. Between 1989 and 2000, the number of national human
rights commissions grew significantly across the continent, from one to twenty-
four (Nowrojee, 2001, p. 1). The trend was nurtured partly by financial and tech-
nical support from donor governments and the United Nations (UN) who viewed
the establishment of these institutions as advancing global human rights promo-
tion and protection. The UN and its agencies, particularly the United Nations
Development Programme (UNDP) and the Office of the High Commissioner for
Human Rights, and the African Commission on Human Rights made national
human rights institutions a major policy priority. Many donor governments also
actively championed and funded the creation of these institutions across Africa
in the hope they would become independent bodies for human rights protection.
The key policy framework for national human rights institutions is the Paris
Principles, a set of internationally recognized principles concerning the status,
powers and functioning of national human rights institutions that were endorsed
by the UN Commission on Human Rights in 1992 and the UN General Assembly
in 1993 (OHCHR, 2013). Since its adoption, the Paris Principles have become the
standard applicable to national institutions with a mandate to promote and protect
human rights (de Beco and Murray, 2014, p. 7). It sets out the basic guidelines
for the establishment of national human rights institutions, defined as a “govern-
ment body established under the constitution or by law to promote and protect
human rights.” The Paris Principles advance the importance of a broad mandate
on human rights protection, a constitutional or legislative founding statute, an
independent appointments procedure, and adequate funding (OHCHR, 1993).
Few African national human rights institutions meet these standards.
 The politics of regime legitimation in Africa 25
Some commentators have interpreted the proliferation of national human
rights institutions as a sign that African governments, including some of the most
repressive, are becoming more accepting of the international human rights dis-
course and an acknowledgment that human rights protection should be a part of
government’s portfolio (Nowrojee, 2001, p. 2). This interpretation may indeed
be true. However, the proliferation of national human rights institutions in Africa
and elsewhere in the world can also be explained in terms of the end of the Cold
War, the collapse of Western and Eastern bloc political alliances, and the demise
of doctrinaire political ideologies. It is not a coincidence that human rights insti-
tutions became popular in the immediate post-Cold War era. In a post-Cold War
world where governments could no longer latch on to international geo-political
ideological alliances to legitimize their rule, human rights became the new and
preferred ideology for legitimizing power.
Such was the appeal of human rights as the new ideology for political legitima-
tion that by 2000, Africa was host to the largest number of government human
rights commissions of any continent. Yet, the continent’s human rights record
stood in stark contrast with the wave of renewed rhetorical and institutional com-
mitment to human rights by governments. Even as national human rights institu-
tions proliferated in the 1990s, much of the continent remained characterized by
authoritarian and repressive regimes, widespread human rights violations, eco-
nomic crises, insecurity, and conflict. Although statist discourses of human rights
had become popular, they did not translate into improvement in actual human
rights conditions.
A study of African national human right institutions by Human Rights Watch
found that these institutions have made limited contribution toward the protection
of human rights in their respective countries (Nowrojee, 2001). It found evidence
to indicate that the flawed mandates and the composition and operation of these
institutions limited their capacity to have a significant impact on human rights
protection. The study concluded that although a few national human rights insti-
tutions such as those of Ghana, Senegal, and South Africa have been progressive
and partly effective, most national human rights institutions have been “a disap-
pointment.” According to the study:

Many have been formed by governments with dismal human rights records,
weak state institutions, and no history of autonomous state bodies. Some
appear largely designed to deflect international criticism of serious human
rights abuses. They have been formed with flawed mandates and weak pow-
ers that limit their ability to effectively investigate, monitor, or make public
statements. Others have been staffed with commissioners who are unwilling
or unable to protest abuses because they are either beholden to the executive
or fearful of reprisal.
(Nowrojee, 2001, p. 4. My emphasis)

Indeed, the work of many national human rights commissions in Africa contin-
ues to be undermined by a lack of independence and the lack of transparency.
26 Bonny Ibhawoh
Some institutions were created only to give the appearance of the government’s
commitment to human rights and to forestall domestic or international pressure
for political reforms. Others have been granted limited powers, pressured into
silence by the executive branch, or manipulated to serve as a mouthpiece for
the government.
When measured against the provisions of the Paris Principles, most African
human rights institutions fall dismally short. Many institutions lack the autonomy
to undertake independent investigations into abuses or make independent recom-
mendations for prosecution. For example, the Kenyan and Cameroonian human
rights commissions were established with the limited mandate to only provide their
findings to the president of the country who then has the discretion of accepting or
rejecting them. This limited mandate has served to damage the credibility of both
institutions in the eyes of the public and undermine the role of human rights com-
missions in holding the government and its agents accountable for human rights
abuses (Toure, 2002, p. 17). In some countries, such as Liberia under Charles
Taylor’s rule, the selection of human rights commissioners was done in a way that
excluded representation from civil society organizations that were critical of the
government. Consequently, the Liberian human rights commission was mainly
concerned with non-state abuses such as domestic violence. Its commissioners
carefully avoided addressing complaints relating to politics or government abuse.
Similarly, the Nigerian human rights commission was set up by the military
government of General Sani Abacha in 1995 in a way that made it incapable
of holding the government accountable for its many human rights violations.
Created by military decree, the commission was created in an attempt to head
off international criticism of military rule in Nigeria and the repressive policies
of the Abacha government. The Commission was mostly ineffective and largely
silent on major human rights abuses of the Abacha government including the
execution of the regime’s political opponents such as the environmental rights
activist, Ken Saro-Wiwa who had campaigned for the rights of the Ogoni people
against the devastation of the Niger Delta by oil companies. For Abacha, “human
rights abuses brought him to power and kept him in charge” (Hafner-Burton,
2008, p. 710). Like the Taylor regime, the Abacha regime rebuffed international
criticism of its human rights record by drawing attention to the establishment of
a human rights commission. When the UN General Assembly voted to censure
Nigeria for the execution of Saro-Wiwa and other activists, the country’s officials
stressed that the government had demonstrated a commitment to human rights and
that those executed had been given a fair trial (Goshko, 1995).
Even before the post-Cold War era proliferation of human rights institutions,
some African governments had realized that human rights talk could serve as
an effective means of deflecting pressure for political reforms. The first national
human rights institution in Africa, Togo’s Commission Nationale des Droits de
l’Homme [National Human Rights Commission] (CNDH), was established by
the authoritarian regime of President Gnassingbe Eyadema in 1987, mainly in
response to international criticism of his repressive single-party rule. The crea-
tion of the commission was one of the government’s concessions to opposition
 The politics of regime legitimation in Africa 27
demands for political liberalization and an end to Eyadema’s 20-year rule. The
CNDH was largely ineffective. When President Eyadema began his crackdown
on the democratic movement, the CNDH was one of the first victims. Its head was
forced into exile and the commission reduced to a passive and largely irrelevant
institution (Nowrojee, 2001, 339). President Eyadema would hold on to power for
another 18 years as head of an authoritarian and repressive government.
In Cameroon, the National Commission on Human Rights and Freedoms
(NCHRF) was also created by presidential decree by one of the continent’s long-
est ruling regimes in the context of the wave of pro-democracy movements in
the 1990s. The NCHRF was among the first institutions created by President
Paul Biya as part of the democratization measures announced in 1990 following
widespread opposition protests. It was evident from the start that the establish-
ment of the commission was a political strategy to pacify opposition demands
for reforms and to legitimize Biya’s one-party rule. The general public saw the
commission as the “Government’s umbrella to cover its human rights violations”
(Gwei, 2000, p. 181).
Hindered by the strong presidential control over its appointment and opera-
tions, Cameroon’s human rights commission lacked credibility and autonomy.
The commission’s funding was dramatically reduced after it criticized govern-
ment abuses in a confidential report on the state of emergency in the North-West
Province. That the commission was a façade is evident from the penchant of the
government to flout its statute. The statutory provision that all political parties
represented in the National Assembly should have members in the commission
has never been respected (Jua, 2003, p. 105). After decades of existence, the com-
mission remains largely irrelevant to human rights conditions in the country and
is seen more as a compliant institution serving the executive branch (Nowrojee,
2001, p. 124). President Biya has survived the pro-democracy wave that swept
away many African dictators in the 1990s and early 2000s. At 2018, President
Biya had ruled Cameroon for 43 years, making him the world’s longest serving
head of state.
Political considerations also informed the creation of Kenya’s national human
rights institution in 1996. President Daniel arap Moi hurriedly established the
Human Rights Standing Committee just two days before the annual donor meet-
ing in Paris to discuss the renewal of Kenya’s aid that was conditional on eco-
nomic and human rights reforms. The largely arbitrary human rights committee
did not meet the standards stipulated in the Paris Principle. It lacked independence
and functioned completely at the discretion of the president. The committee was
tightly circumscribed by executive control and undermined by its questionable
legal status since it was not created through the proper parliamentary procedures.
The committee proved to be ineffective and critics condemned the seemingly
empty rhetoric used by the government to appease international human rights
criticism (Schmitz, 2009, p. 64).
The story is largely the same with the human rights commissions established in
North African countries. In Algeria and Tunisia, the impetus for creating human
rights commissions came mainly from domestic pressure arising from the growing
28 Bonny Ibhawoh
strength of Islamist political activity. In the wake of rising security challenges
and the crackdowns against Islamist opposition movements, human rights institu-
tions were created by the Algerian and Tunisian governments to show a commit-
ment to democracy and human rights. Algeria’s Observatoire National des Droits
de l’Homme [National Observatory for Human Rights] (ONDH) was created in
1992, shortly after the annulment of parliamentary elections won by Islamists. A
military coup ousted the president, leading to a state of emergency and crackdown
on Islamists that unleashed a wave of violence across the country. The human
rights commission was established by a presidential decree at a moment when
“authorities were aware that to establish legitimacy after halting the democratic
process, they had to appear attentive to human rights” (Nowrojee, 2001, p. 38).
In Tunisia, President Zine el-Abidine Ben Ali created the Higher Committee
for Human Rights and Fundamental Liberties in 1991, at a time when his govern-
ment faced increased human rights criticism and pressure for reform. Similarly,
the Conseil Consultatif des Droits de l’Homme [Human Rights Advisory Council]
(CCDH) was created by King Hassan II by royal decree in 1990 in response
to domestic pressure for reforms and international condemnations of the gov-
ernment’s human rights record. The establishment of the council was in direct
response to the criticism that the government faced for its entrenched control of
the Western Sahara, despite the UN involvement in the conflict, and for its crack-
down on Islamist opponents (Cardenas, 2014, p. 120). The council was essentially
an advisory body to the King with no real investigatory or prosecuting powers.
None of the North African human rights institutions has had significant impact on
improving human rights conditions in these countries. The wave of pro-democ-
racy protests and uprisings during the Arab Spring of 2010 and 2011, that swept
away entrenched regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, and Libya, is evidence that these
human rights institutions did not have much impact.
If human rights institutions in Africa have not served the intended role of pro-
tecting human rights, why have they become so popular and whose interests have
they ultimately served? My argument here is that these institutions have been
more effective as political instruments for regime legitimation than as mecha-
nisms for rights protection. The Moroccan Human Rights Advisory Council for
example, has been more effective as a propaganda arm of the government than as
a human rights protection agency. The council has tended to emphasize the posi-
tive aspects of Morocco’s human rights record and has shown deference toward
authorities on the most politically contentious issues. Similarly, Tunisia’s Higher
Committee for Human Rights and Fundamental Liberties was seen within the
human rights NGO community as nothing more than a mouthpiece to defend gov-
ernment abuse. The committee has portrayed Tunisia’s poor rights record in a
positive light and ignored glaring violations of the country’s international human
rights obligations. The assessment of the committee by Tunisia’s independent
human rights community is that it has contributed little, if anything, to redress-
ing or deterring abuses. Rather, it has positioned itself among many government-
created entities whose sole purpose is to “burnish the government’s human rights
record” (Nowrojee, 2001, p. 38).
 The politics of regime legitimation in Africa 29
The politics of truth commissions
The politics of regime legitimation that has characterized the establishment and
processes of human rights commissions is also increasingly evident in the work
of truth commissions that have proliferated across the continent. One of the great
ironies of the development of human rights institutions in Africa is that the first
truth commission on the continent was established by one of the most ruthless
dictators. In 1974, President Idi Amin established the Commission of Inquiry into
the Disappearance of People in Uganda (Hayner, 2001, p. 51). Given Idi Amin’s
own extensive record of human rights violations, it is incongruous that he would
establish a commission to investigate human rights abuses. It is unlikely that his
government had any intention of abiding by human rights doctrine (Perry and
Sayndee, 2015, p. xvii). Idi Amin’s creation of a truth commission soon after
he seized power from the elected government of President Milton Obote in a
military coup, was clearly part of his efforts to gain domestic acceptance and
international legitimacy.
Since the establishment of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation
Commission (TRC) in 1996, truth commissions in Africa appear to have served
less as mechanisms of victim-centered transitional justice and more as political
instruments for governments to further statist agendas. It is estimated that of about
67 national truth commissions that have been established globally, one third have
been established in Africa (Perry and Sayndee, 2015, p. xvii). Across Africa, truth
commissions have been deployed both as mechanisms of post-conflict transitional
justice (South Africa, Rwanda, Sierra Leone, and Liberia) and democratic tran-
sitional justice (Nigeria, Ghana, Kenya, and Gambia). Although they differ in
composition and purpose, the core mandate of truth commissions is to investigate
human rights violations and provide public accounting of the causes, patterns, and
consequences of political violations. A common goal is to recover the truth about
rights violations and narrate national histories in the context of state (re)building.
Such truth commissions represent the hope that collective acknowledgment of
past atrocities, reflection, and repair can help build less violent, and more just and
inclusive societies.
While post-conflict truth commissions established in the immediate aftermath
of conflicts focus on accountability for war crimes, democratic transitional jus-
tice truth commissions are typically concerned with the longer-term democratic
transition in the aftermath of authoritarian rule. The Nigerian and Ghanaian
truth commissions emerged in the context of transitions from authoritarian rule
to multiparty democracy. Nigeria’s Human Rights Violations Investigation
Commission (which became known as the Oputa Panel, after its chairman,
Justice Chukwudifu Oputa) was set up in 1999 to investigate and recommend
redress for human rights violations committed in the country under previous
civilian and military governments. It received over 10,000 statements of human
rights violations and conducted public hearings characterized by rancorous
debates over culpability for past atrocities that revealed the country’s ethnic and
political fissures.
30 Bonny Ibhawoh
The most controversial issues that the commission addressed centered on
alleged massacres during the Nigeria-Biafra civil war in the 1960s, and conflicts
over oil resources in the Niger Delta. Ethno-political groups appropriated the com-
mission as a formal space for rewriting histories and evoking politicized memory
to mobilize constituencies, claim and reclaim political territories, and gain access
to social and economic resources (Yusuf, 2007; Nwogu, 2007). The commis-
sion’s final report indicted the military and successive civilian governments for
gross human rights violations. Among its recommendations were constitutional
reforms, compensation for victims, and programs for women’s empowerment and
gender equity. The commission also recommended broad consultations of civil
society about Nigeria’s constitutional structure, improved human rights educa-
tion, and attention to the social, political, and environmental conditions in the
Niger Delta and other troubled spots in the country.
Although welcomed by civil society groups, the commission’s findings and rec-
ommendations were rejected by the government which unexpectedly annulled the
commission and suppressed its report on the grounds of a Supreme Court ruling
that questioned the investigative powers of the commission. However, even before
the court ruling, it was clear to most observers that the Obasanjo government,
which set up the commission, had become uneasy about the broad scope of its
investigations and the recommendations for sweeping political reforms. Popular
assessment of the Nigerian truth commission is that it failed on several fronts.
Although the commission produced an extensive catalogue of human rights abuse
spanning several governments, the government that created it neither acknowl-
edged its findings nor implemented its recommendations. This meant that the
commission’s efforts had limited effects on Nigerian society and the development
of human rights policies (Guåker, 2009, p. 15; Perry and Sayndee, 2015, p. xvii).
Ghana’s National Reconciliation Commission (NRC) did not fare better.
Established in 2001, the commission was mandated to investigate human rights
abuses committed under past unconstitutional regimes, and to foster an environ-
ment of government transparency and accountability. Although the title of the
NRC did not include the word “truth,” ascertaining the truth about past human
rights abuses was considered to be a core objective. The commission was charged
with promoting national reconciliation among Ghanaians by establishing “an
accurate and complete historical record” of human rights violations related to kill-
ings, disappearance, detention, torture, ill-treatment, and seizure of property dur-
ing the periods of unconstitutional government (Ghana NRC, 2004, vol. 2, p. 3).
Individual citizens could petition the commission to investigate specific issues
within its mandate. The commission conducted two years of investigations and
public hearings where it heard testimonies from over 2,000 victims and 79 alleged
perpetrators. It found that the legacies of colonial rule contributed to a culture of
human rights abuse and that post-colonial law enforcement institutions and the
armed forces were responsible for most abuses. It recommended a comprehensive
reparation program of public apologies, memorials, and monetary compensation.
However, the political tension between the two main political parties in the coun-
try made it difficult to agree on a shared truth about the history of human rights
 The politics of regime legitimation in Africa 31
violations. This stifled implementation of the commission’s recommendations
(Alidu and Ame, 2013, p. 18).
Some scholars have argued that a truth commission was a prudent choice for
Ghana rather than criminal prosecution in dealing with its violent past. While
a truth commission might not be a panacea for all the problems encountered in
a transitional democracy, it offers a better solution and hope than the alterna-
tives available (Ameh, 2006, p. 105). However, other scholars have noted that
Ghana’s truth commission was more political theatre than anything else and that it
was plagued with overt politicization of the institution from start to finish (Asare,
2018; Valji, 2006, p. 47). It was established nine years after the country’s return
to democracy, raising questions as to whether there was really need for a truth
commission at that point. Historian Abena Asare has argued that Ghana’s deci-
sion to join the growing community of African nations using TRCs to wade into
the past had more to do with politics than human rights protection. The creation
of the National Reconciliation Commission was part of the competition between
the country’s two major political parties: the New Patriotic Party (NPP) and the
National Democratic Congress (NDC). For the newly elected NPP, demanding a
truth and reconciliation process was a way of framing its electoral success as a
“moral victory,” similar to the end of apartheid in South Africa which necessitated
the establishment of the TRC (Asare, 2018, p.1).
President John Kufuor and leaders of the NPP justified the NRC as the first
step in the journey toward human rights accountability, national unity, and eco-
nomic growth. For the outgoing NDC, however, a truth commission was seen
as an attack on the person of Jerry Rawlings, the military dictator turned demo-
crat, whose two-decade rule was the focus of the truth commission. The NDC
objected strongly to the creation of the NRC, framing it as a political strategy to
discredit it and the previous Rawlings regime. Critics referred to the NRC not as
the National Reconciliation Commission but as the Nail Rawlings Commission
(Fair and Gadzekpo, 2011, p. 61). This situation set the tone for an acrimonious
controversy that undermined the work of the commission from its inception. The
commission was criticized for alleged bias in dealing with witnesses leading to
accusations that it was nothing more than a political witch-hunt. Even though the
commission’s public hearings and witness testimonies led to an unprecedented
public accounting of Ghana’s past, the lasting image of the Ghanaian NRC was a
“site of partisan contest, not citizen testimony” (Asare, 2018, p. 37).
Kenya’s Truth, Justice and Reconciliation Commission was created by a par-
liamentary bill in 2008 to investigate and recommend appropriate action regarding
abuses committed between the country’s independence in 1963 and the inaugura-
tion of a new coalition government in 2008. This followed disputed presidential
elections in 2007 and the eruption of post-election violence along ethnic lines.
About 1,500 people were killed in the clashes and almost 300,000 were displaced
from their homes. The clashes subsided only with the intervention of the UN
and the African Union, which brokered a power-sharing coalition government
among President Mwai Kibaki and opposition leader Raila Odinga. The creation
of the Justice and Reconciliation Commission was one of several measures taken
32 Bonny Ibhawoh
to address the political crisis and the violence that followed. Its mandate was
to investigate the gross human rights violations and other historical injustices in
Kenya, including incidents of politically motivated violence, assassinations, dis-
placements, and major economic crimes and irregular acquisition of land.
After more than three years of investigations and public hearings in which
more than 100 people testified and over 40,000 statements were submitted, the
Commission submitted its report in 2013. The report documents extensive human
rights violations and other injustices committed in Kenya from the British colo-
nial period to the administrations of Presidents Jomo Kenyatta, Daniel arap Moi,
and Mwai Kibaki, including during the 2007–2008 post-election violence (Kenya
TJRC Report vol. 1, 2013; Slye, 2018). The commission recommended prosecu-
tions, reparations for victims, institutional changes, and amnesty in exchange for
truth for perpetrators who did not commit gross human rights violations. The
report stands as “an official record of the state’s complicity in serial human rights
violations, a state whose institutions are frequently exposed as corrupt and in cal-
lous disregard of the fundamental human rights of citizens” (Ndungú, 2014, p. 5).
Kenya’s truth commission is widely believed to have failed (Lynch, 2018,
p. 3). Members of the commission came under immense political pressure from
the government to influence the report (Slye, 2018). The difficulties surrounding
the truth commission process and its final report reflect the reluctance of the polit-
ical leadership to account for the country’s dark past. The commission’s report
came short on the issue of ethnicity and inter-ethnic conflict, which was identified
as a cause of some of the worst violence experienced in the country, including
during the bloodshed that followed the 2007 elections. The commission’s report
faced serious challenges, including the government’s reluctance to publish it
widely and several court cases disputing its contents (ICTJ, 2014). Despite finding
the Kenyan Army to have been responsible for alleged crimes, no recommenda-
tions for institutional reform are made regarding this branch of the armed forces
(Ndungú, 2014, p. 10). The commission also largely ignored issues of social and
economic rights which were within its mandate (Slye, 2017, p. 306).
The establishment of the Zimbabwe Human Rights Commission (ZHRC) by
the government of Robert Mugabe in 2009 was also a direct fallout of protracted
political and economic crises in the country. Its main mandate was to investigate
human rights abuses following widespread violence arising from the disputed
presidential elections in 2008. Like many African political leaders of the immedi-
ate post-colonial era, Mugabe’s politics hinged on a Cold War-era revolutionary
socialist rhetoric that he used to legitimize his rule and justify economic poli-
cies, notably his land redistribution policy. With the crippling economic crisis in
the new millennium and protests against the government, the regime resorted to
repressive tactics against its political opponents. There were widespread reports
of systematic and widespread violations of human rights by the regime and the
ruling Zimbabwe African National Union – Patriotic Front (ZANU–PF) (Howard-
Hassmann, 2010).
Facing international isolation and growing pressure for political liberalization,
the Mugabe government made some political concessions. These included the
Another random document with
no related content on Scribd:
 It was to the beauty of Louis XIV.’s hair when he was a little boy,
that the huge, hideous periwigs seem to owe their invention.
Nature’s ruling has its exceptions in the bestowal of naturally curling
head-covering, and desiring to offer the sincerest flattery of imitation,
the French courtiers and the ingenuity of the coiffeurs combined to
invent the huge periwigs, which in some sort of fashion even
contrived to live through the French Revolution and the Terror itself;
for did not Robespierre preside at the great Feast of the Supreme
Being in about the ugliest, primmest bobtail wig ever fashioned on
barber’s block?
As to the women’s dress in France, it varied somewhat according
to their rank. Middle-class bourgeoises wore the scantiest covering
out-of-doors on their necks and shoulders; not even in church was
their attire more modest. To so scandalous a length was this carried,
that it brought on them more than one remonstrance from the pulpit;
and Englishwomen, taking as always, their fashions from Paris,
followed suit. A Nonconformist English divine published a translation
of a French work by “A grave and learned Papist”—possibly the Curé
of St Étienne—who reprehended in no measured terms the
“shameful enormity,” as he phrased it, of this style of dress. The
ladies of the great world ordinarily went with more circumspection in
the streets, and nearly always, also, they wore a mask. It was
generally made of black velvet, lined with white satin. It fixed itself on
the face with a spring, and was fastened with a thin wire, which was
terminated by a glass button that could be dropped between the lips,
and so disguise the voice. The female style of dressing the hair was
to gather it up in a bunch at the crown of the head, leaving some
curls to hang on each side of the face; over this was placed a sort of
little linen hood, the points of which usually reached to the shoulders.
The gowns were wide-sleeved and long-waisted, with a skirt
embroidered or trimmed with lace. A small dog was almost
indispensable to a lady of fashion. The little creatures were very
pretty, generally having pointed muzzles and ears. Women took snuff
and smoked, and the traces of these habits were apt to leave their
ugly reminders about their persons and dress.
 A great many new streets and houses were added to the city. The
increase in the number of public vehicles rendered the streets very
noisy, while the filth of the ways was indescribable; but this did not
hinder women from walking in velvet slippers, or pages and lackeys
from wearing bright, gold-laced scarlet livery.
The state of morals, from highest to lowest, was at a low ebb. Vice
permeated every class, from the clergy and nobility to the dregs of
the populace. Murder and barefaced robbery took place constantly in
the streets; the rage for gambling was boundless, and the cardinal-
minister made no attempt to check the shameful licence of the green
tables.
Yet Paris was fair and brilliant to the eye when Maria Théresa
made her entry in the most magnificent carriage of the cortège which
occupied three hours in passing. The princess was not beautiful; but
her expression was amiable, and her complexion very fair for a
Spanish woman. She wore a mantle of violet velvet embroidered
with golden fleur-de-lis over a robe of white brocade covered all
down the front with a splendid rivière of emeralds, and she wore her
crown with infinite grace and dignity.
The fierce light that beats upon the lives of kings and queens was
at its fiercest when cast upon the life of the Sun-King. His marriage
with the Spanish princess was one of policy and convenience, and
as such there have been unions more disastrous. If love played no
great part in it, at least the king was true to the dignity and a certain
gentle courtesy and good-nature underlying the pomp and
extravagant display with which he was pleased to surround himself;
and Maria Théresa’s record of a queen’s life bears no startling
evidence of unhappiness or discontent—something indeed to the
contrary.
 CHAPTER XV

Réunions—The Scarrons—The Fête at Vaux—The Little Old Man in the Dressing-

gown—Louise de la Vallière—How the Mice Play when the Cat’s Away
—“Pauvre Scarron”—An Atrocious Crime.

The return of St Evrémond brought about the restoration of the old

pleasant Monday and Friday réunions of the rue des Tournelles—
whose regularity so many untoward events had greatly and for so
long interfered with.
Ninon could afford to dispense with the less interesting society of
the Louvre, where, except for Madame de Choisy’s friendship, no
very cordial hand had ever been extended to her; while the cultured,
refined Bohemianism of her salon was probably more acceptable to
many of her distinguished friends. They at all events gathered there
numerously. Monsieur de la Rochefoucauld, ever faithful to the
beautiful Duchesse de Longueville; Condé; the brilliant society
doctor of his day and memoir writer, Guy Patin; Monsieur de la
Châtre, also a chronicler of his period; Monsieur de Villarceaux,
Corneille, whose tragedy of Œdipus brought him back in high-
heaped measure the success which had waned since the production
of The Cid, so greatly that he had nearly lost heart for dramatic work;
Molière—these two the brightest and best-beloved stars of Ninon’s
firmament. Monsieur Voiture was now no more. His empty niche was
filled by Boileau, who introduced to her his young friend, Racine.
Occasionally, by kind permission only of Madame de la Sablière,
came la Fontaine. Among the ladies of her company were Madame
de la Fayette, the authoress of Zaïde and of the Princesse de
Clèves; Madame Deshoulières, called “the French Calliope”; and, as
healing Time’s wings now and again bring, it was Molière himself
who effected pleasant relations once more with Julie de Rambouillet,
now Duchesse de Montausier; Madeleine de Scudéri, the
distinguished précieuse, held aloof.
On Wednesdays the Scarrons received their friends, most of those
the same as Ninon’s. Françoise had now long been the wife of
Scarron, and his wit and her beauty attracted a numerous company.
The brother of Françoise had not mended his ways. He was still the
ne’er-do-well result of his miserable bringing up; yet there was
something not to dislike, even something of a soul of good in
d’Aubigné’s evil. The poor crippled poet and his wife were happy in
their union. Scarron had indeed but two faults to find in his Françoise
—one of them to wit, that she devoted herself too closely to him, at
the sacrifice of health and spirits. She had copied all his Roman
Comique for him in her beautiful handwriting, and Scarron, noting
that she looked pale and fatigued, begged Ninon to take her about a
little with her into the gaieties of life.
Scarron’s chronic ailments had not affected his appetite; possibly
amusement being necessarily very restricted for him, his naturally
gourmand proclivities had increased. This was to such an extent,
that his wife went ever in fear of his indigestions, and when he
suggested that she would be so much better for occasional
absences from home, Ninon did not ascribe it to pure and simple
anxiety for Françoise, but also to his seizing a better chance for
eating three times as much as was good for him. Her vigilance in this
particular was the other defect he perceived in her. The desired
opportunity, however, soon presented itself.
Monsieur Fouquet, the powerful superintendent of finance, was a
friend of Ninon—that and nothing more—and one day he confided to
her that he had fallen in love with the daughter of the maître d’hôtel
of the Duc d’Orléans, and desired to ask her hand in marriage. He
hoped, in fact believed, that she was not indifferent to him; but to
make certain, he asked Ninon, such an adept in the tender passion,
as he said, to watch her at the great fête he was about to give at his
magnificent estate at Vaux. It was to be on a superb scale. All the
Court, with all the Upper Ten, were invited guests. They were to
appear in masquerade costume. Ninon, holding that the good turn
Monsieur Fouquet sought of her, merited his ever generous
consideration, asked him to allow her to bring a lady friend with her
to the fête; this favour he accorded with great pleasure, and Ninon
delightedly informed Madame Scarron that she was the chosen
friend. Equally delighted, Madame Scarron selected her fancy
costume; it was that of a Normandy shepherdess, and confectioned
with all the good taste of Françoise. The tunic was of yellow cloth,
with Venice point undersleeves, her collarette was of Flemish lace,
and Ninon lent her some of her diamonds wherewith to adorn her
ribbon-tied crook. Ninon’s costume was composed of pearl-grey
satin, trimmed with silver lace stitched with rose-coloured silk, an
apron of black velvet, and a cap plumed with crimson feathers.
With many instructions to Nanon Balbien, the maid-servant, to
take good care of her master, and to keep a close eye on him at
meal-time, Madame Scarron drove away in the coach with Ninon to
Vaux, where they duly arrived.
Le Nôtre, the royal gardener, had received orders to construct a
splendid ballroom in the middle of the park, and, in the depths of
winter though it was, he achieved a triumph of gorgeous
magnificence. Orange trees were massed within the huge tent, and
flowers of every hue were brought together from every hothouse and
possible quarter, to render the scene a veritable fairyland, glowing in
the thousand lamps depending from the gilded chains winding amid
the sheeny foliage.
But who has not heard of that fête, the ill-omened thing that
brought its lavish giver disaster? Among the guests—named indeed
first on the list of the invited—was she whom Fouquet sought to
honour, perhaps even for whom he organised the entertainment—
Louise de la Vallière; and among the male masquers dancing vis-à-
vis to her, murmuring low as they met, was one habited as an old
man in a dressing-gown, domino sort of cloak, who was, in sooth,
but a young man, the king, Louis XIV. It was not the first dawning of
their love that night at Vaux. Already, at a ball at the Louvre, Louis
had given her a rose, one that was incomparable for sweet perfume
and loveliness. Innocent or politically guilty, it was all one for the
great superintendent of finance. He had dared to love the woman
Louis loved, and the doom of Fouquet was sealed.
And the merry going out of Ninon and her friend also found a
mournful coming in; for when they arrived in Paris next morning and
Françoise alighted from the coach, Nanon hurried to the door to
meet her. “Ah, mademoiselle—madame!” she cried, with a face wild
with distress and terror, “he is dying! he is dying!—my poor master!”
“Bonte divine! how did it come about?” asked the two ladies in a
breath.
Nothing more simple. The master, to begin with, immediately on
the departure of Ninon and his wife for Vaux, had despatched Nanon
with a note to his good-for-nothing brother-in-law. D’Aubigné, having
read the note, said that it was all right, and he would come and pass
the evening with Monsieur Scarron. Nanon, thus feeling herself free
also to enjoy an evening out like the rest, spent it with Jean Claude,
a young man cousin of hers; but when at a fairly decent hour she
returned home, an appalling picture met her eyes. On the table
prepared for supper, lay, or stood as might be, seven empty bottles,
the bones of a capon on the empty plates, with the crumbs of two
Chartres pasties, and an empty Strasburg goose pot, also well
cleared, madame’s brother under the table, and Monsieur Scarron
lying back in his wheel-chair, waxen-white, speechless, but
convulsed with a hiccough, a terrible hiccough that had never
ceased all night, Nanon said.
“Fly for a doctor!” cried Ninon.
And one of grave and profoundly calm aspect appeared, and
proceeded to examine his unconscious patient’s condition; then he
shook his head. “He is a dead man,” he said.
 “Ah, quick, Nanon! Quick to the rue de l’Arbre Sec, for Doctor Guy
Patin.”
“What!” cried the doctor, with almost a yell of horror, “the foe to
antimony! I would sooner see the devil himself!” and he fled; for the
battle of antimony was at fierce pitch just then. As a medicinal agent
it was opposed by the medical profession to such an extent, that the
Parliament of Paris forbade its use; although already many of the
profession were as strongly in its favour. Meanwhile Ninon sprinkled
the face and hands of the sick man with cold water. He opened his
eyes and recognised the two.
“Ah!” murmured he, “what a delicious supper. In this world, I fear, I
shall never have another like it.”
“We have sent for Guy Patin. He will cure you.”
“Guy Patin?—yes, he is a grand creature; but, ah!”—and the
hiccough, which had momentarily ceased, recommenced. “Well,
people don’t die of a hiccough, I suppose,” went on Scarron—alas!
for the mistake!—“but that goose, and the pasty, how excellent they
were! Take your pen, dearest Françoise—it is indigestion—yes, but
one of rhymes—till Guy Patin comes. I will see what rhyming will do
for me—some good, surely, for my rhymes shall be of Ninon. Take
your pen, Françoise, and write.”
And as well as she could for her tears, the poor wife wrote
Scarron’s swan’s-song in praise of Ninon. “Well, are they
detestable?” he asked then, between the never-ceasing convulsion
of hiccoughs. “No matter. I have rhymed—on my deathbed—for it is
useless to deceive myself—I—I die.” One last convulsion, that shook
his whole distorted frame, seized him, and he fell back dead.
Then from the depths of the room loomed a dishevelled figure. It
was d’Aubigné. “Dead!” he murmured, leaning over the corpse of his
boon companion. “Well, he ate—all—and I—drank all. De
profundis”—and he shuffled out.
Guy Patin entered, but all was of no avail now for “le pauvre
Scarron,” as he called himself.
 No ordinary character of a man was the first husband of Françoise
d’Aubigné, the woman he so sincerely loved and admired, so
disinterestedly loved, that he would, had she desired, have denied
himself the happiness of living in her society—for he had offered her
the choice of placing her en pension in a convent at the expense of
his own scanty incomings. Driven from his rights as a child, gifted
with great wit and talent, and a generous kindliness, he was beloved
by a large circle of friends. First the victim of cruel, iniquitous neglect,
oftentimes his own enemy, the crosses of life never blighted the gifts
of his intellect, or, it may be added, of his industry. In straitened
conditions touching on absolute poverty, the gaieté du cœur of Paul
Scarron never forsook him, and if he could have lived a while longer,
for his own sake, as he certainly would for hers for whose future he
was ever anxious—he said with that labouring dying breath, that he
could not have supposed it so easy to make a joke of death.
He had composed his own epitaph long before—
“He who lies sleeping here beneath,
Scant envy but great pity won,
A thousand times he suffered death,
Or ere his life was lost and done.
Oh, Stranger, as you pass, tread light,
Awaken not his slumbers deep,
For this, bethink you’s the first night
That poor Scarron is getting sleep.”

A terrible event—that thrilled society, and indeed everyone, with

horror—occurred in the South of France about this time. To the Court
at Paris it struck especially home; inasmuch as the victim of the
fiendish perpetrators of the crime was the Marquise de Castellana, at
the time of her presentation at Versailles. She was then very young.
She brought her husband, a grandson of the Duc de Villars, an
immense fortune, and her beauty was so remarkable as to
distinguish her amid the many beautiful women of the young kings
Court. Louis, indeed, showed her marked attentions, and she was
known as the beautiful Provençale. Very soon, however, the
marquis, who was in the naval service, perished in a shipwreck; and
a crowd of young and titled men flocked around the lovely young
widow as suitors for her hand. Her choice fell on young Lanède,
Marquis de Ganges, and for the first year or so of their married life
they were very happy in their home at Avignon. Then slight
disagreements arose between them. He began to yield to
dissipation, while he accused her of coquetry. More than that he
could not apparently bring against her. He had two brothers, the
Abbé and the Chevalier de Ganges, and both these men fell deeply
in love with their beautiful sister-in-law. In his capacity of a
churchman, the young wife confided many of her thoughts and her
affairs to the abbé. This he used as a tool to influence his brother,
the marquis, as it better suited his own designs, either to ruffle his
anger against her, or to smooth it. Then one day he pleaded his own
passion to her. She repulsed him. The chevalier made a similar
attempt, and was similarly rejected. Furious at this, they made
common cause, and vowed to be revenged on her. First they
attempted to poison her by putting some deadly stuff in her
chocolate, but for some reason the attempt failed. It is thought that
the deadly properties of the poison they used, were nullified by the
milk, and she experienced no more than a passing uneasiness.
Rumours of the attempt began, however, to circulate in Avignon and
the neighbourhood; and the marquis proposed to his wife that they
should go to his castle at Ganges to spend the autumn. She
consented; though with some misgiving. The Castle of Ganges was
a gloomy place surrounded on all sides by sombre avenues and
densely-growing trees. After a short time spent with his wife at
Ganges, the marquis returned to Avignon, leaving her in the care of
his two brothers. A little while previously, a further large inheritance
had fallen in to her, and she had begun to have such suspicions of
the integrity of the family to which she had allied herself, that she
made a will, confiding, in the event of her death, all her property to
her mother, in trust, till her children, of which she had two or three,
should be of age. The abbé and the chevalier, discovering what she
had done, never ceased their endeavours to persuade her to revoke
this will. What successful arguments they could have used to effect
this, it is difficult to conceive—unless they employed threats—and
these possibly they did use; since, after another abortive attempt to
poison her, they one day entered her bedchamber, where she lay
slightly indisposed with some passing ailment. The abbé approached
her with a pistol in one hand and a cup of poison in the other, the
chevalier following with a drawn sword in his hand. “You must die,
madame,” said the abbé, pointing to the three fearful means for
accomplishing the purpose. “The choice of the manner of it is to
you.” The unfortunate woman sprang from her bed, and fell at the
feet of the two men, asking what crime she had committed.
“Choose!” was all the answer.
Resistance was hopeless, and the unhappy lady took the cup of
poison and drank its contents, while the abbé held the pistol at her
breast. Then the two assassins departed from the room, and locking
her in, promised to send her the confessor she begged for.
Directly she was alone she tried to choke back the poison, by
forcing a lock of her hair down her throat; then, clad only in her
nightdress, she clambered to the window and let herself drop to the
ground, lying nearly eight yards below. That the exits and doors were
all watched she had little enough doubt; but by the aid of a servant,
who let her out by a stable door, she gained the fields. The two men
caught sight of her, and pursuing her to a farmhouse where she had
sought refuge, they represented her as a mad-woman, and the
chevalier hunted her from room to room of the house, till he trapped
her in a remote chamber, where he stabbed her with his sword,
dealing two thrusts in the breast, and five in the back, as she turned
in the last endeavour to escape. Part of the sword-blade had
remained in her shoulder, so violent was the blow. The piercing cries
of the unhappy lady now brought a crowd of the people of the
neighbourhood round the place; and among them the abbé, who had
remained without to prevent any effort on her part to escape.
Anxious to see whether she was dead, he presented his pistol at her,
but it missed fire. This drew upon him the attention of the crowd, and
they rushed to capture him; but with a desperate struggle he got
away.
 The marquise lived for nineteen days after this fearful scene; but
all hope of life was gone. The corroding poison had done its fell
work. Her husband was with her in her last moments, and she strove
in her dying agonies to clear him of complicity in the foul murder; but
the evidence against him was too strong, and the Parliament of
Toulouse condemned him to confiscation of his property, degradation
from his rank of nobility, and perpetual banishment. The chevalier
escaped to Malta, where he soon after died, fighting against the
Turks. The abbé fled to Holland, and assuming another name, his
identity was lost. It is said that this horrible crime was but the
prologue to many subsequent iniquitous adventures in which he was
the prime mover. The sentence of being broken on the wheel which
was passed on these two criminals, and was too good for them, they
thus contrived to evade. Their execrable record lives among the long
list of Causes Celébres of the time.[5]
 CHAPTER XVI

A Lettre de Cachet—Mazarin’s dying Counsel—Madame Scarron continues to

Receive—Fouquet’s intentions and what came of them—The Squirrel and the
Snake—The Man in the Iron Mask—An Incommoding Admirer—“Calice cher,
ou le parfum n’est plus”—The Roses’ Sepulchre.

It was in the very presence of the dead Scarron that Ninon was
informed of the danger threatening St Evrémond. A lettre de cachet
had been issued for conveying him to the Bastille, for the offence he
had given in writing some satirical verses on the Peace of the
Pyrenees. St Evrémond was very far from standing alone in his
opinions on this treaty carried through by Mazarin; but he was
unapproachable in the expression of them. Biting invective and
caustic wit at the cardinal’s expense were graven in every line of his
couplets, addressed to the Marquis de Créqui. Nor did the mockery
cease at that point; it ridiculed the royal marriage itself, and the king
was furious. This was the second time that St Evrémond had
incurred the displeasure of Mazarin; on the first occasion, a
reconciliation had been patched up, after a three months’ sojourn for
St Evrémond in the Bastille, but this time he was past forgiveness—
possibly, as it has been surmised, that in addition to the verses, he
had given secret offence to the Court—and it was now but a matter
of tracking St Evrémond to his hiding-place; for he had been warned
of the letter of arrest for shutting him up in the Bastille, probably this
time for the rest of his life. He had found refuge in the convent of the
Capucins du Roule; but already his goods and money were
confiscated, and it was Ninon who carried him, from her own
resources, the necessary notes and gold for his getting away under
cover of the night to Havre, where he arrived safely, and took ship for
Dover, never to return to France.
The Majesty of Louis XIV. was as a thing divine; and the faintest
shadow could not be permitted to cross the glory of that sun he
chose for his double-mottoed device. Cardinal Mazarin, now at the
point of death, renewed his counsel to the young king never to let will
thwart his, but ever to bear the sceptre in his hand—in his own hand
alone. So Mazarin, dealing his parting thrust of revenge on the
queen-regent, died in the castle of Vincennes, unregretted by any,
tolerated of later years, but despised by all. Someone made his
epitaph, whose concluding lines were to the effect that having
cheated and deceived through life, he ended with cheating the devil
himself, since, when he came to fetch away his soul, he found he
had not one.
Madame Scarron, after her husband’s death, decided to live in the
same apartments, in preference to the home which Ninon offered her
in her own house. The widow’s friends obtained for her a pension of
two thousand livres, and she continued the old réunions, and soon
recovered from the loss she had sustained; for Françoise d’Aubigné
was ever distinguished by her calm, equable temperament.
After the fête at Vaux, Monsieur Fouquet, continuing his attentions
to Mademoiselle de la Baume, finally asked her hand in marriage of
her parents. They were well pleased, especially her father. Madame
de la Baume would have seemed more to favour another destiny for
her daughter. The king was enraged on learning the superintendent’s
proposal, but Fouquet braved the royal displeasure, and intended to
take his bride to Holland. So the man proposed; but the Fates had
otherwise disposed. Within a few hours, a letter was brought him; he
broke the seal hurriedly, recognising the beloved handwriting, and
when he had read the letter—but two lines long—he sank back in his
chair as if a thunder-stroke had smitten him.

“Renounce me. Think of me no more. I am not worthy to be the wife of

an honest man.
Louise.”
 It needed no more. Fouquet divined the truth, and he broke into a
storm of invective, and abuse of the king. To silence him, to warn him
of the perils surrounding him, of his many bitter and jealous enemies,
of the clouds of witnesses, false and true, ready and waiting to bring
charges of peculation and misappropriation of finances against him,
was of no avail. The fire of disappointed love consumed him, and he
raged against the despoiler of his happiness. The jealous king,
informed by those who had heard Fouquet’s wild words, had waited
not an instant, and thirty soldiers of the Guard were on the way to
the Hôtel of the Superintendence to arrest him; but warned of their
coming, he made his escape from the house. Too late. Before he
could reach the frontier he was taken; and in the fortress of Pignerol
he spent nineteen years a prisoner, after a protracted trial before a
packed tribunal, and nobly defended by Advocate Pelisson, his
devoted friend, a devotion for which Pelisson suffered long
imprisonment in the Bastille.
The jealousy of Louis in regard to Mademoiselle la Vallière,
however, probably only hastened the fall of the man on whose ruin
Colbert, comptroller-general of finances, and his successor, had long
been determined. On the walls of that magnificent Vaux mansion of
Fouquet’s was painted and carved his crest—a squirrel with the
device, “Quo non ascendam?” This squirrel was pursued by a snake,
and on the arms of Colbert was also a snake.
The lavish extravagance of Fouquet was almost beyond the
bounds of credibility. He stopped before no expenditure for
indulgence of his own pleasure, and in fairness it must be added, for
that of others. Courteous and kindly, intellectually gifted, his open-
handed generosity to men of letters and of talent generally was
boundless. Like our own “great lord cardinal,” “though he was
unsatisfied in getting, yet in bestowing he was most generous,” and
again and again he aided the State with money from his own private
means. It is said that at the fateful entertainment at Vaux, to which
Louis XIV. was invited, each of the nobles found a purse of gold in
his bedchamber, “and,” adds the same writer, “the nobles did not
forget to take it away.” When his disgrace came, it was the great who
deserted him; the people of talent clung throughout to their friend
and benefactor. Colbert, his deadliest foe, artfully instilled into Louis
that it was the ambition of Fouquet to be prime-minister. There is
little doubt that this was true. Colbert’s ambition for the post was not
less.
On his arrest, Fouquet was first sent to the castle of Angers,
thence to Amboise, thence to Moret and Vincennes, then he was
lodged in the Bastille, and finally, on his condemnation, to the
fortress of Pignerol. After a three years’ trial, the advocate-general
demanded that he should be hanged on a gallows purposely erected
in the courtyard of the Palais de Justice, but the votes for his death
were far in the minority, greatly to the fury of Louis and of Colbert.
While abuse, however, and charges of maladministration of the
finances were brought against him, peculation could not in any way
be established. In a generation of time-serving and venality, the
staunch devotion and affection of Fouquet’s friends remained
unchangeable. “Never,” wrote Voltaire, “did a placeman have more
personal friends; never was persecuted man better served in his
misfortunes.”
Madame de Sévigné, who had a warm regard for Fouquet,
expresses her fear in more than one of her letters, that he may be
secretly done to death by poison or by some other means of
Colbert’s devising. His friends suffered cruelly, in many cases, for
their loyalty to him. The gentleman, Monsieur de Roquesante, who
had spoken in favour of him—a Provençal—was banished in the
depths of winter to the chills of Lower Brittany, and the members of
Fouquet’s family were scattered, to find shelter where they could.
At Pignerol, Fouquet was treated with great rigour. Some few
months after his arrival there, a peril of another kind came very near
to him. The lightning of a heavy thunderstorm struck the powder-
magazine of the fortress, and it exploded, burying many in its ruins.
Fouquet, who was standing at the moment in the recess of a
window, remained unhurt. Mystery hangs over the last days of his
life; for while it is said that he died in his captivity at Pignerol, his
friend Gourville states that he was set at liberty before his death.
Voltaire also declares that Fouquet’s daughter-in-law, the Comtesse
de Vaux, confirmed the fact of this to him. Another surmise, and one
that found wide acceptance, is that although he was liberated for a
while, he was rearrested, and that it was he who was the mysterious
individual known as the Man in the Iron Mask.
Human Nature loves a mystery, and would resent being deprived
of this most memorable enigma in modern history, by any
reasonable and certain solution of it, could it be beyond all doubt and
question established. Again and again it has been explained and
explained away, but it is, as Galileo declared of the earth and the
sun: e pur se muove. The Man in the Iron Mask stands the Man in
the Iron Mask—which was, in fact, not of iron, at all, but of stoutly-
lined velvet, as the loups and masks of the time nearly always were
made. Probably this mask was secured by extra strong springs and
fastenings, as mostly was the case for prisoners of distinction, when
they were being conveyed from one place of captivity to another.
Such kind of explanation was afforded to Ninon by the governor of
the Bastille when she discussed the point with him. There was, he
said, no mystery at all in it. Yet the possibility remains that it did not
suit the governor of the grim old prison-house absolutely to lift the
veil covering its secrets, even to Ninon.
It has been contended that it could not have been Fouquet; since
the Iron Mask’s death is recorded in the register of the Bastille,
where he was confined for the last five years of his life in November
1703, and Fouquet, at that date, would have been in extreme old
age, which this prisoner was still short of. Not being Fouquet, was it
Count Matthioli accused of betraying the French Government, in the
matter of putting a French garrison into Casale to defend it against
Spain? Was it the Duke of Monmouth, after all not beheaded in
England? Was it the child of Buckingham, the bitter fruit of his
intrigue with Anne of Austria? Was it the twin brother she was said to
have borne with Louis XIV., as Dumas tells—he who was taken by
d’Artagnan from the Bastille, and placed on the throne of France,
while the other Louis was shut up in his stead, the substitution
remaining undiscovered, so great was the resemblance between the
two—undetected by the queen, Maria Théresa, herself. The
romance is well founded, but even for the great master of romance it
goes far. Was it—No; the mystery, like Sheridan’s quarrel, is “a very
pretty mystery as it stands. We should only spoil it by trying to
explain it.”
Ninon was troubled at this time with an unsatisfactory, rather
casual admirer, Monsieur le Comte de Choiseul, an individual of
whom it was difficult for her to decide whether his pertinacity or his
supreme self-conceit predominated. Monsieur Précourt, the
celebrated dancer, an intimate acquaintance of hers, whom she one
morning invited to breakfast with her, did her the good service of
finally relieving her of de Choiseul’s incommoding presence. The
breakfast was laid for two, and Choiseul, entering, was about to seat
himself, whereupon Précourt claimed the place at table, and
Choiseul, declining to stir, Précourt invited him to adjourn to the
neighbouring boulevard with him, and settle the matter at the sword’s
point. Choiseul replied that he did not fight with mountebanks. That
was as well, Précourt retorted, since they might make him dance;
and the unwelcome one took his hat, went out from the house, and
did not return.
The liaison of Louis with Mademoiselle de la Vallière was now
generally known; and notwithstanding the warning of the disgrace
and banishment of St Evrémond, satirical rhymes began to circulate
at the expense of the royal favourite and her lover Deodatus. How
fortunate he was, said Bussy Rabutin, “in pressing his lips on that
wide beak, which stretched from ear to ear”; and forthwith the poet
found himself lodged in the Bastille.
Physically, the beauty of La Vallière was not flawless. Her mouth
was somewhat large; but it has frequently been said, that somehow
the defect of her lameness only added to the grace of her
movements, which were at once so gentle and dignified, while her
magnificent, dark dreamy eyes and her soft winning smile rendered
her singularly charming; and if Louis ever loved any but himself, it
was Louise de la Vallière, who so passionately loved, not Louis the
king, but the ardent wooer and winner of her heart. There is a story
of the rose-tree from which Louis plucked the rose which he offered
her on that ball night in the Louvre. It had been cultivated by le
Nôtre, the famous gardener of Versailles, and was an object of his
tenderest care; so much cherished, that he was far from pleased
when he saw the king pluck its loveliest blossom for la Vallière. She
regarded the rose-tree which had borne it with the tenderness one
feels for some beloved sentient thing, enlisting le Nôtre’s interest in
it, which in its way was as great as her own; and wherever she went
to spend any length of days, the rose-tree was transported in its box
of earth to the gardens of the palace—Versailles or the Louvre, as it
might be—and for two years the beautiful bush flourished under the
joint care of le Nôtre, and of the king’s beloved mistress. And in her
gentle confidences with Mademoiselle Athénais de Mortemar, the
fiancée of Monsieur le Marquis de Montespan, with whom she was
great friends, she told her the romance of her rose, and how it was
her belief, her superstition—call it what you will—that while it
flourished, Louis’s love would be hers.
And then all at once the rose-tree began to fade. Slowly but surely,
despite all the skill of le Nôtre, rapidly it withered, and he carried a
handful of the earth of the new box, into which he had transplanted
the tree, as a last resource, to a chemist for analysation. Nothing
more simple: vitriol had been poured on the earth, a drop or two at a
time, and the root was corroded to dry threads. And for la Vallière, it
was only left to make a little mausoleum for her rose-tree in the
shadow of a retired thicket round the bosquets of Versailles—a little
crystal globe upon a low marble stand; and within it, in a box
exquisitely enriched with gold filigree, the withered rose-tree, to one
of whose branches was fastened the faded rose, whose petals still
hung together; and thither to the secluded spot every day came la
Vallière to kneel at the tomb of her rose-tree, and kiss the shadowy
souvenir of the love that had faded for ever. Just a few petals left of
its countless leaves, so sweet and glowing once in their crimson
beauty.
And Mademoiselle Athénais de Mortemar’s nuptials with Monsieur
le Marquis de Montespan having been solemnised, the wife was left
by the complaisant husband to become the second mistress of Louis
XIV., and this ere the first was discarded, and Maria Théresa still a
youthful wife. The two children of la Vallière the king legitimised by
Act of Parliament; but soon Louise was seen no more at Court. She
found refuge and rest for weariness and regrets of heart and spirit
within convent walls.
And now Anne of Austria succumbed to the fell disease which had
insidiously attacked her, and she died, and was borne to St Dénis
with great pomp, followed by Louis the king, clad in deepest
mourning.
 CHAPTER XVII

A Fashionable Water-cure Resort—M. de Roquelaure and his Friends—Louis le

Grand—“A Favourite with the Ladies”—The Broken Sword—A Billet-doux—La
Vallière and la Montespan—The Rebukes from the Pulpit—Putting to the Test
—Le Tartufe—The Triumphs of Molière—The Story of Clotilde.

By the advice of Guy Patin, Ninon’s constant friend and medical

adviser, she went to drink the chalybeate waters of Forges les Eaux,
in Picardy. Not that there was the least thing the matter with her;
only, as the wise doctor said, “Prevention was better than cure.”
Besides, well or ailing, everybody of any consequence went there; it
was the thing to do, ever since Anne of Austria had taken a course of
the waters, and a short time after had given birth to the child Louis,
the heir to the throne of France, whose coming had been so long
hoped for.
Time had brought its sorrows to Ninon. It had treated many of the
friends of earlier years with a hand less sparing than its touch on her.
Among those passed away into the sleep of death, was Madame de
Choisy. A great mutual affection had existed between the two
women ever since they had first met, and the severance saddened
Ninon. At Forges, she knew there would be many of her friends and
acquaintance, old and new, and instead of going to spend the spring
days at the Picpus cottage, she yielded to the persuasions of
Madame de Montausier and of Madame de la Fayette, and went to
drink the waters, mingle in its comparatively mild dissipations, and
join in the gay school for scandal for which Forges was as noted as
are the run of hydropathic resorts. It lies some half-way between
Paris and the coast by Dieppe. One of the three springs it contains is
named after the queen, presumably the one which brought Louis the