Jacqueline Moudeina

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Jacqueline Moudeina (born April 17, 1957 in Koumra , Chad ) is a Chadian lawyer and human rights activist.

Life

Education and exile in the Republic of the Congo

Jacqueline Moudeina comes from the Mandoul region in southern Chad and grew up as an orphan. Her father, a well-known physician, died a few weeks after her birth at a poisoning after he had refused earlier to work for the French colonial government in the African country. She graduated from high school in the capital, N'Djamena . In 1979 she enrolled at the University of Chad to study English. However, the ensuing Chadian civil war and the subsequent reign of terror of the dictator Hissène Habré forced Jacqueline Moudeina and her husband to leave the country. Between 1982 and 1995 she lived in exile in Brazzaville ( Republic of the Congo ), where she studied law . In 1993 she joined the Congolese section of the human rights organization ATPDH (Chadian Association for the Promotion and Defense of Human Rights), which had recently been founded in Chad .

Lawyer for the victims of the Habré dictatorship

After returning to her home country, she was one of the first women in Chad to work as a trainee lawyer and as a legal representative for the Chadian office of the ATPDH in N'Djamena. Since then she has been campaigning primarily for the rights of women, children and disadvantaged population groups and fights against the ignorance of the government and against impunity for human rights violations .

Since 2000 she has been a lawyer for the victims of the Habré regime. A commission of inquiry appointed after his tenure accused Hissène Habré of being responsible for around 40,000 politically motivated murders. Among other things, he ordered the mass killing of relatives of the Sara (1984), the Hadjerai (1987) and the Zaghawa (1989). In 1990 he fled to Senegal , where he lived a luxury life for a time. In 2000, Jacqueline Moudeina filed a lawsuit against Habré in Senegal; At the same time, she filed a complaint against his security officers in Chadian courts. The Senegalese Supreme Court dismissed the lawsuit on the grounds that it did not have jurisdiction. Jacqueline Modeina and the victims she represented then tried to bring Habré to a court in Belgium so that he could answer for his actions there - on the basis of the principle of universal law . She managed to get a Belgian investigative judge to take up the case, interview former followers of Habré in Chad, inspect mass graves and internment camps, and put archive material on file. He charged Habré with crimes against humanity , war crimes and genocide and issued an international arrest warrant against him. Belgium applied for Habré to be extradited from Senegal. The African Union , however, demanded that Habré be tried in Senegal, since no African head of state outside Africa should be convicted. Senegal initially delayed the start of the trial and declared in 2011 that no legal proceedings would be opened against Habré. Jacqueline Moudeina again campaigned for him to be tried in Belgium. In July 2011, Chad officially applied for the extradition of Habré, which Senegal refused. From July 2, 2013, Habré had to answer for war crimes, torture and crimes against humanity before a special court in Dakar ("Chambres Africaines Extraordinaires"). On May 30, 2016, Habré was sentenced to life imprisonment for rape, sexual slavery, and ordered illegal killings during his reign.

Other ATPDH projects

In 2004 Jacqueline Moudeina was elected chairwoman of the ATPDH. The organization offers seminars and training for children and runs AIDS education . One focus of the work is the fight against child slavery. Due to poverty and poor education, many farmers in Chad sell their children for the equivalent of 10 US dollars to cattle farmers who need cheap labor to tend their herds. Sometimes the children are abducted without their parents' consent . If the children do not do their work to the satisfaction of the herders, they are beaten and in some cases even murdered. This practice is to be ended by creating “vigilance circles”, but also by providing financial support to the farmers.

In addition, Jacqueline Moudeina is committed to ensuring that human rights are observed in connection with a pipeline project between the Chadian oil fields near Doba and the port city of Kribi in Cameroon . She demands appropriate compensation for environmental damage .

Violence and death threats against Moudeina

Jacqueline Moudeina's work faces great opposition in Chad. On June 11, 2001, during a peaceful demonstration against election rigging in N'Djamena, she was hit by a hand grenade thrown at her feet by a soldier. She suffered serious injuries that required a 15 month hospital and rehabilitation stay in France ; some fragments of the grenade are still in her leg, preventing her from walking. Although she was advised to stay in France, she returned to her home country. Shortly before Christmas 2003, unknown people broke into and ransacked her office. In 2005 she received a scholarship from the Dickinson School of Law at Pennsylvania State University as part of the Scholars at Risk program . At the beginning of 2008, she was intimidated several times by the authorities in her country after she and her organization revealed that the government of President Idriss Déby also sent child soldiers to the Chadian-Sudanese war (within the Darfur conflict ). She received several death threats and had to flee to the French military base in N'Djamena. These events led her to apply for asylum in France.

Awards

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Arts for Amnesty International - Jacqueline Moudeina The Human Rights Painting Project (accessed September 29, 2011)
  2. ↑ a b c d Jacqueline Moudeina (Chad) ( Memento of the original dated November 4, 2011 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 118 kB) Right Livelihood Award Foundation (accessed September 30, 2011)  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.rightlivelihood.org
  3. ^ Les combats de Jacqueline. Le specter du régime d'Hissène Habré demeure afrik.com, September 8, 2003
  4. ↑ a b c Margarete Jacob, hope despite all odds. - In: amnesty journal, February 2004 ( online version )
  5. ^ A b Affaire Habré: les Tchadiens peuvent compter sur la Belgique Slate Afrique, July 28, 2011
  6. ↑ African Rights Groups Back Habre Court Human Rights Watch, November 2, 2014
  7. ↑ L'affaire Habré ( Memento of the original from May 31, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link has been inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. chambresafricaines.org (accessed December 31, 2014)  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.chambresafricaines.org
  8. ↑ Hissène Habré sentenced: Life sentence for Chad's former dictator . Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, May 30, 2016.
  9. ↑ a b The Challenge of Human Rights in Chad ( Memento of the original from November 29, 2010 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was automatically inserted and not yet checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. The Witness, April 13, 2005  @1@ 2Template: Webachiv / IABot / www.thewitness.org
  10. ↑ Youths in Chad seized, forced to fight on border Relief Web, January 19, 2006

Web links

personal data
SURNAME Moudeina, Jacqueline
BRIEF DESCRIPTION Chadian lawyer and human rights activist
DATE OF BIRTH April 17, 1957
PLACE OF BIRTH Koumra , Chad