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Al-Ahram Weekly 16 - 22 December 1999 Issue No. 460 
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Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Al-Ahram Weekly 16 - 22 December 1999 Issue No. 460
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| Published in Cairo by AL-AHRAM established in 1875 |
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Egypt Region International Economy Opinion Culture Debate Focus Profile Living Travel Sports People Time Out Chronicles Cartoons Letters A week in the world
Still the silent treatment
By Gamal Nkrumah
It would take a heart of stone not to note that mankind's best efforts to cast off the sins of the past are always given short shrift by the international media. Events such as Americans kicked out of the Panama Canal zone or the fact that Rome's Colosseum will be bathed in a golden light for 48 hours whenever an individual's life is spared by a stay of execution, emerge only if one is paying the closest attention.
Last Wednesday, 293 British parliamentarians from the Commons, Lords and the European Parliament handed the Florida Supreme Court a signed petition that the life of Krishna Maharaj be spared. Because of the international media's lack of interest in Death Row inmates, the chances are that few readers would have come across Maharaj, 60, a former millionaire and a British citizen born in Trinidad, accused of shooting to death his business partners. But, Maharaj had the strangest trial: a judge who was led away from the trial in handcuffs, a replacement judge who refused to restart the trial and hear the evidence for himself and who asked prosecutors to draft the death penalty before the arguments had been completed, and two victims who were mixed up in narcotics-trafficking. Ironically, Maharaj's own brother Ramesh, the attorney-general of the Caribbean twin island nation of Trinidad and Tobago -- and who had his legal training in London paid for by elder brother Krishna -- has spearheaded Trinidad's overzealous reintroduction of capital punishment. Small wonder he has consistently ignored Krishna's plight.
But on a brighter note, in Rome, Italy, on Sunday, Sister Helen Prejean, the American nun whose fight to end the death penalty was poignantly dramatised in the film, Dead Man Walking, was guest of honour at a ceremony marking the beginning of a campaign to end capital punishment worldwide in the year 2000. The ceremony ended with Prejean giving the 2000 campaign's "thumbs-up" sign, a reminder of the imperial gesture which in ancient times spared a gladiator's life. The Colosseum, the grizzly amphitheatre where gladiators and ferocious carnivores fought to the bitter end, has historically been a symbol of cruel death and ruthless punishment. It is tremendously heartening that today, as we approach the end of the Christian second millennium, the noxious landmark that witnessed the death of many innocent Christians and "pagans" is turned into a shrine dedicated to ending the death penalty. The ancient killing ground has become a symbol of life and mercy.
An end to capital punishment is long overdue. And the 2000 campaign against the death penalty is strongly supported by the United Nations, the European Union, Amnesty International, the Roman Catholic peace group Saint Egidio and, of course, Pope John Paul II. But when will the international media see the light?
Death and destruction traditionally draw journalists like moths to a lamp. But who now can say that the fight for life is burning far down the wick?
Another subject that receives the silent treatment is food grabs during the festive season. This week, in Montreal, Canada, some 150 self-styled "commandos" broke into a restaurant in Chateau Champlain, an up-market hotel. They grabbed the food and dished it out to the city's poor, homeless and hungry. Next, they marched along Saint-Catherine Street chanting slogans, eating and giving food to street people. Montreal's homeless were bused in from the city's poor Centre-Sud neighbourhood chanting "la charité ne guérit pas la pouvreté", or "charity is no cure for poverty". Food-grab strikes traditionally increase during the festive Christmas season.
Panama, too, has been in a festive mood. Celebrations marking the transfer of the Panama Canal into Panamanian hands on 31 December echoes Egypt's own nationalisation of the Suez Canal four decades ago. The US built its military presence in Panama ostensibly to defend the canal, but actually it was done to train thousands of its forces to fight in foreign tropical wars.
Panama, which gained independence from neighbouring Columbia in 1903 under the wing of Washington, remained a virtual American colony for much of the century. Soon after independence, it signed an agreement with the US for the construction of the Panama Canal which was inaugurated in August 1914. In 1989, the US invaded Panama to capture military dictator Gen Manuel Noriega, who had nullified an election and was wanted on narcotics-trafficking charges in the US. Noriega now languishes in an American jail.
Former US President Jimmy Carter, who signed the hand-over deal with the late Panamanian strongman Gen Omar Torrijos -- presumably assassinated by the US Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) -- attended the canal festivities which kick-started on Tuesday. US President Bill Clinton declined an invitation to attend Tuesday's ceremony and Secretary of State Madeleine Albright cancelled her trip at the last moment. "The United States missed a good chance to look good in front of the world. There was a lack of class in its attitude," said Roberto Eisenmann, an adviser to Panamanian President Mireya Moscoso. No stamp of approval for a lack of class.
