8th August 2018, Freetown, Sierra Leone
The Centre for Accountability and Rule of Law (CARL) welcomes the Government of Sierra Leone’s renewed commitment to the International Criminal Court (ICC), and for pledging to enact domesticating legislation that would make the Rome Statute, the ICC’s foundation document, part of Sierra Leone’s legal code.
In a roundtable conference organised by CARL on the 20th anniversary of the Rome Statute, Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Alie Kabba said his government remains fully committed to advancing global peace and justice through the International Criminal Court and other human rights mechanisms. Minister Kabba described his government’s commitment to international law as “solid”, adding that there can be no global peace and justice without respect for international law.
Minister Kabba said the Government of Sierra Leone will continue to honour its obligations under international law.
“We have no intention of retreating on our international obligation…We want the world to be a place where every child, every woman, everyone for that matter, has access to justice”, he told conference participants.
“We are very clear about our commitment. That is why we appreciate the fact that Sierra Leone already ratified the Rome Statute…We will need to ensure that there’s always the procedure in place within our judicial system for everyone to have access to justice”, he added.
Sierra Leone ratified the Rome Statute nearly 18 years ago, but efforts by rights groups for the Government of Sierra Leone to incorporate its provision into our national laws have been largely unsuccessful. Reflecting on the nearly 15-year effort by both national and international groups, Manifesto 99 Director Rahim Kamara, said a bill for the domestication of the Rome Statute was drafted in 2006, but there has been a general lack of political will to enact it. He urged the government to stand against global impunity by continuing to support the International Criminal Court and ensuring an expeditious enactment of the law.
“We’ve fought against impunity in our country; we have to fight against impunity wherever it rears its head anywhere in the world,” Mr. Kamara said.
The Chairperson of the Human Rights Committee of Parliament, Hon. Hindolo Gevao, expressed his personal commitment to the domestication of the Rome Statute and urged the relevant state actors to draft the bill without delay.
“If those who are responsible for drafting the bill do so and lay it before Parliament, as a Member of the Legislative Committee and the Chairperson of the Human Rights Committee of Parliament, I assure the nation that we’ll do everything humanly possible to expeditiously vet it sentence by sentence, page by page, and paragraph by paragraph, to ensure that it is passed”, he said.
CARL’s Executive Director, Ibrahim Tommy, reminded the government of its obligation under the Rome Statute and urged the new administration to scale up support to the ICC and to take steps for the speedy enactment of an ICC Act.
“The ICC is confronted with several challenges, which is why the Government must increase its direct support to the court and demonstrate commitment to the principle of complementarity under the Rome State”, Mr. Tommy said.
Funded by the African pro-democracy group Trust Africa, the roundtable brought together representatives of Government, including the Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation, the Parliamentary Committee of Human Rights, the Legislative Committee of Parliament, and civil society groups working on domestication and ICC-related issues, to discuss the AU–ICC relationship as it relates to the positioning of the Sierra Leone Government, and provide civil society actors an opportunity to interface with state representatives on the question of domestication of the Rome Statute – and the Government’s plans, if any, to domesticate the Statute.
The Rome Statute was created in 1998 and took effect in 2002. The Rome Statute proscribes crimes of genocide, war crimes, crimes against humanity, and the crime of aggression. Sierra Leone, one of the signatories of the Rome Statute, has not domesticated this treaty through an Act of Parliament – thus limiting the implementation of the Rome Statute principles through the domestic courts.
