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No legal way of defying the rule of law Editorial: Team EritreaDaily. net Oct. 31, 03 There is no legal way of breaking the law.
Consequently, there is no legal way of defying the rule of law, either. But that
is what defiant Ethiopia keeps vainly and feverishly fantasizing about by
misquoting the perfectly legal process of resolution of the Cameroon vs.
Nigeria matter and turning it into precedence that only exists in the
distorted imagination of Ethiopia rulers’ dysfunctional state of terminal
denial of reality. The reality is that the Algiers Agreement
is unique, hence no precedence, not because it is “final, binding and without
appeal” with prior consent to accept and abide by, which is standard in any judiciary
setting where finality and closure is sought, but because of the fact that
the EEBC ruling is 100% guaranteed noncompliance proof. That means the ruling
will be implemented as determined by the EEBC. To that effect, both
parties requested and were granted a priori guarantee that the ruling,
wherever the chips may fall, will indeed be implemented as decided, if
necessary by use of force, whereby USA, EU, UN, AU accepted and were
empowered and authorized to function as guarantors of the ruling and thereto
committed and obliged themselves to exercise it as well. And the reality of the Cameroon-Nigeria
mixed commission (CNMC) is that it is not an alternate mechanism set up to
reverse, renegotiate, or amend the ICJ ruling over their matter. To the contrary,
the CNMC was set up to implement the ICJ ruling as decided, by making it
politically palatable and rendering the consequences of the ruling acceptable
and endurable to people and real-estate matters (as requested by Nigeria) based
on and following the unequivocal bilateral acceptance to treat the ICJ ruling
as final and binding and to abide by it. And if that were what Ethiopia
was striving for, then nobody has said it better than the chairman of the
EEBC: “There is no “crisis”, terminal or otherwise, which cannot be cured by
Ethiopia’s compliance with its obligation under the Algiers Agreement, in
particular its obligations to treat the Commission’s delimitation
determination as “final and binding” and “to cooperate with the Commission,
its experts and other staff in all respects during the process of
..demarcation”. But that is not and has never been what Ethiopia is striving
for. Ethiopia called for the complete reversal of the ruling under the threat
of war because it is not in its favor, just as simple as that. And when that
didn’t happen, Ethiopia unilaterally dismissed the Boundary Commission,
declared it’s ruling null and void, and said it won’t accept any thing less
than new border negotiation in its favor. Ethiopia justifies this its reckless action
by mal-citing Nigeria’s initial reaction subsequent to the ICJ ruling in its
border issue with Cameroon. What a shame and how disrespectful of Nigeria,
because Nigeria did not call for reversal of ICJ ruling in its favor, did not
call for the dismissal of the ICJ, did not declare the ICJ ruling null and
void, nor did Nigeria threaten to go to war if its concerns were not met. As
a matter of fact, Nigeria’s initial negative reaction was not at all directed
at the ICJ ruling per se but at the lack of mechanism to accommodate its
concerns about the consequences of the judgment such as political
palatability and making them acceptable and bearable to people and land
matters. The swift establishment of the CNMC, less than two months, and its
subsequent eventless progress and accomplishments is only testimony to that.
And that is a matter in public records! With that in mind, Nigeria’s initial
negative reaction to a judgment that is “final, binding, and without appeal”
and with prior consent to accept and abide by, was a legal way of challenging
not breaking the law because the nature of the ICJ ruling did anticipate
noncompliance in which case the compliant party was granted to have recourse
to UNSC, hence opening the door for another way of resolving the matter, if
it chose so, but did not preclude Nigeria from consulting third parties
including the UNSG regarding its noncompliance. To the contrary and a lot of things being
equal, the nature of the PCA/EEBC ruling ruled out categorically any thing
and every thing but compliance. Equally, and a lot of things being equal,
while Nigeria’s “No” to the ICJ ruling is legal, Ethiopia’s application of
the same kind of “No” to EEBC ruling is illegal and constitutes defiance of
rule of law because the nature of the EEBC ruling rules that out for it is
100% guaranteed to be implemented; and that is what makes the EEBC ruling
“NO”-phobic and “YES”-philic. That is the nature of the EEBC ruling that came
into being upon Ethiopia’s insistence because it didn’t trust Eritrea. Thus,
Ethiopia’s fantasy obsession with the Cameroon/Nigeria matter to reverse the
border ruling remains just that: Nightmarish fantasy. Another reason Ethiopia
is holding to its fantasy is because it is politically correct thing to say
to camouflage its bogus search for peaceful solution refrain that it repeats
at the end of every statement in order to secure its life support system:
Continuous flow of western aid. Otherwise, the Cameroon/Nigeria thing does
not hold water and it is not going to fly no matter in what form and how
often they repeat it. Politics as they say is dirty, but the rule of law is
clean: You abandon it or you preserve it. It can’t be negotiated or
renegotiated. Ethiopia’s action is outright defiance of
the rule of law and has not and cannot have any excuse or justification
whatsoever. And Nigeria’s action is no excuse/justification for that because
Nigeria’s action was not to defy the rule of law but to seek ways to make it
politically palatable and humanly endurable, which was easily achieved
without violating the sanctity of the ICJ ruling. Yes, there is no legal way of defying the
rule of law. So, even if Ethiopia’s citations of Nigeria’s legal way of
reacting to ICJ were to be considered admissible to justify its own action,
then Ethiopia must abide by, not defy the rule of law because that was the
end effect of Nigeria’s reaction. Contrarily, Ethiopia’s citations of
Nigeria’s perfectly legal action is only a solid proof not an
excuse/justification for Ethiopia’s blatant and outright defiance of the rule
of law, for there is no legal way of defying the rule of law. There is no and there can’t be any other
explanation for Ethiopia’s action but arrogant, blatant, and outright
defiance of the basics of the rule of law. Eritrea will prevail |