McGill Human Rights Interns

Today, it will have been exactly a week since I started my internship at Equitas. I feel very lucky to be spending the summer in Montreal. The city is so lively this time of year, with so many festivals and events to check out during the weekends, and beautiful scenery – and flowers – everywhere. Throughout this summer I will aim to share my thoughts both on the internship and life in Montreal during the summer.

My role as an intern for Equitas is to help plan and implement their renowned 3 week long conference, the International Human Rights Training Program taking place in June. The program brings together participants who work in local human rights organizations in their countries. Participants come from all over the world, including West Africa, the Middle East, Eastern Europe, South America, and South Asia. They attend the program to learn valuable skills and make important contacts which they can then use to improve their organization’s programs and advocacy/lobbying efforts back home. I like the idea of the program because it is tailored to the needs of the participants and is meant to give them the necessary resources to work on their own grassroots level programs. Participants learn a lot – from the best ways to lobby the state for change, to how to deal with conflict arising during their training and advocacy sessions with the community they serve, as well as how to mainstream a gender analysis into their organization’s work among other things. The organizations represented at the IHRTP are very diverse both in terms of their religious, political, and ethnic backgrounds, and in the type of activism they engage in and the causes they defend.

Over the past week, I have started working on several tasks in view of preparing for the program. Every day has been interesting. My colleagues are all friendly and welcoming, and they are very helpful whenever I have questions about a certain task or about the program. I have learned a lot in only a week. The more I learn about the program, the more I look forward to the month of June. Before starting my law studies, I completed my undergraduate studies in political science and East Asian studies at McGill. I took several classes that focused on international development, and learned a lot about the successes and failures of the various international actors that work in the field. An important lesson from past failures is the importance for actors with resources – mostly actors from the North who wish to operate in the South – to respect the needs and voices of those they seek to help, and not to try to impose their own views of what the human rights issues are in the country’s context and how to best deal with them.  Throughout this week I have had the chance to learn about Equitas’ work culture, their goals and mission, and it is clear that the way the program was designed reflects this idea of respecting the needs of those you seek to help.

Those were some of the thoughts I had during my first week. I am looking forward to the rest.

 By: Éloïse Ouellet-Décoste

When I was still in Cambodia, I was not sure how I could draw on my experience to discuss access to justice and  legal empowerment. With a partial judiciary controlled by the executive and no effective law enforcement, the  majority of Cambodians do not only feel disillusioned by formal institutions or distrust the legal system; they  fear the law.

With a bit of distance from the field, I now realize that I too quickly equated access to justice with courts. But  beyond the ability to use courts to further one’s interest or resolve conflicts, access to justice is ultimately about overcoming injustices. So how did the victims of human rights violations LICAHO works with understand justice?

In a country were injustices (forced eviction, land grabbing, extortion, exploitation etc) are widespread and often perpetrated by the authorities, justice means at the least respect for people’s basic rights. Cambodia’s law and its Constitution are quite progressive, especially if compared to other countries in the region. The problem is that the judiciary interprets very liberally the laws to suit the interests of those in power, while ignoring the rights drafted to protect the interests of the poor. For example, the 2001 Land Law comprises a series of provision protecting landowners from forced eviction, requiring compensation for expropriation for public interest purposes and provides for mechanisms to acquire property rights via non-violent occupation. But these provisions are not applied. Meanwhile, the penal provisions of the 2001 Land Law, notably illegal occupation of private property or destruction of private property, are repeatedly deployed against communities using non-violent resistances against land grabbing and/or forced evictions.

In such a context, legal empowerment is necessary in order for these communities to know the rights they have and understand the recourses that exist. But awareness to the law and to one’s rights has its limits. Reducing one’s understanding of legal empowerment and access to justice to the use of formal law and processes (as suggested by Eisenberg et al. in their study of litigation and well-being in India) is inevitably counter-productive, because it fails to take into account corruption and elite capture of state institutions. The danger of focusing on legal approaches is the depoliticization of social injustices. When there is no political will to strengthen legal institutions and uphold people’s rights, then the legal avenue soon comes to a dead end.

For example, during my internship, a community activist representing villagers in a land dispute was charged with incitement under the new Penal Code after filing a complaint against the corporation that was illegal clearing their farm lands. What can legal empowerment achieve when those who seek to defend their rights are meet with violence and threat perpetuated through the judiciary?

The partiality of the judicial system is a significant barrier to legal empowerment and access to justice, especially where the court system becomes a political tool for the government to pursue its agenda and repress opposition and human rights activism. In his article, Banik talks about the perception of legal empowerment as a zero-sum game. Redressing imbalances is often perceived as undermining the dominance of the elite. Perhaps it does not have to be so, but, in Cambodia, I definitively experienced this perception. The elites are pursuing a campaign to undermine the work of human rights defenders. By controlling mass media, the ruling party (in power for over 20 years now) actively seeks to maintain ignorance in the population. Human rights defenders presenting alternative narratives and highlighting the abuses perpetrated or concealed by the authorities are perceived as threats to the dominance of the elites. Consequently, the authorities not only violate human rights, but also actively go after those who seek to promote and protect them.

Therefore, citizens find themselves at the mercy of the justice system, rather than feeling that it is a viable avenue through which to claim their rights and resolve disputes. Faundez rejects the idea that poverty is the consequence of the absence of legal protective mechanisms. In a place like Cambodia, I do not think it is either realistic or desirable to expect that improving people’s knowledge of the law and strengthening the law and legal processes is sufficient to truly foster justice. Without tackling the structural causes of poverty and socio-economic disparity and fully taking into account prevailing political, social and economic conditions, I doubt social transformation can occur in places like Cambodia were corruption is endemic and political and economic power tightly intertwined. The legal cannot be addressed in isolation from the political. Consequently, legal approaches can only be an effective tool of social transformation if complemented by extralegal activism and self-help initiatives.

From Edward Bechard-Torres

We had arrived at Minkoaméyos, a small town straddling a main road just beyond the outskirts of Yaoundé, when a colleague of mine recited that worn fetish: “Work in the field is always more complicated: you learn how all those laws you’ve been reading about translate into practice”.

My colleagues were making rounds in the village to houses that had been designated by a UK-based NGO to be demolished and re-built according to a model designed to curb the incidence of malaria in children. I was to piggyback onto these visits to interview residents on the methods by which they came to access their plots of land.

There was always going to be more to property law than what was provided for in the medley of inherited laws and local ordinances. Our visit that day underscored the role property law may play in the construction of identities and of perceived communities.  More precisely, in Minkoaméyos, property rules almost certainly help cement perceived differences between the locals – les autochtones – and the non-locals – les allogènes. To explain, not every Cameroonian possesses a right to title any bit of land. The right to undergo the titling process on a specific plot of land flows from a certificate of traditional occupancy, a document that, in essence, certifies that one’s “ancestors” occupied a given plot of land. It is hard to imagine any world where one’s ancestors continually occupied a single plot of land, but that is the only story these certificates permit.

If a “foreigner” intends to acquire titled property, he would have to either purchase that certificate of occupancy and undertake the titling process himself, or he would otherwise have to wait for a “local” to title the plot and then purchase the titled land. In Cameroon’s urban centres, I have been told, most of the land occupied has been purchased, even if in an informal sense; few plots are still held by the original occupying family. The widespread absence of original occupants signals an aggregate shift of property holdings away from a less-efficient allocation, based on a families’ historic occupancy, to a more efficient one that privileges those who stand to benefit most from close proximity to urban markets.

In Yaoundé’s satellite villages, however, the property holders’ composition is mixed. In some villages, the difference between the autochtones and the allogènes is stark. In these places, the allogènes may be wealthier, mostly holding employment in Yaoundé, and take advantage of the relatively inexpensive cost of land to build gated dwarf mansions, which stand in stark contrast to the mud-based housing of the indigenous. In Minkoaméyos, the separation is invisible; the “foreigners” are residents drawn from the surrounding region who mostly hope to gain employment at the budding water treatment facility within the town’s limits. The “foreigners” do not appear to be any wealthier. They are culturally similar and occupy by and large similar houses to their “indigenous” neighbours.

And yet those differences, traceable to property law, may have generated a sense of group identity, with an accompanying sense of solidarity between imagined kin. The end of my day had me sitting under a large aluminium sheet that shelters a family’s supply of wood. The family’s eldest sister – they are allogène – informed me that les indigènes often “sell” the same piece of land to multiple buyers. To avoid being defrauded, incoming families often have to signal to other prospective buyers that that portion of the property has been “purchased”. I have seen walls of houses, for instance, that have been inscribed with the forbidding “DO NOT BE MISTAKEN, THIS HOUSE AND LOT HAVE ALREADY BEEN SOLD”. Her family had bought a virgin plot, and to evidence their occupation they decided to immediately erect an improvised residence. That need to construct has imposed a double cost – the family lives in an unstable house that imperils the health of its residence, while its construction diverted needed savings away from the mother’s project to build a more durable, adequate familial home. The vendors have stumbled with handing over the certificate needed for her family to title the land – a “he has it, no she has it” kind of affair – and her working family is simply too busy to put the kind of pressure needed to get things moving. Throughout her story, the family are referred to merely as “les autochtones”. At the end, the eldest sister points to a small plot across the path, recently acquired by another family of allogènes. She tells me that she watches out for this family as well, to make sure that les autochtones do not try and pull a fast one on her apparent comrades.

The community could have been studied exclusively through its property norms. We repeatedly found wives busying themselves alone in their home, where they spend the lion share of their waking minutes. In spite of their reliance on their husband’s living quarters, they were ignorant on their property status. The most basic questions went notably unanswered. Nearby, a large family’s property is held communally in a collective title, kept at the home of the communal matriarch. This sub-community prefers to manage their property relations amongst themselves, perhaps according to custom, and eschew the application of State law. The entirety of the property is titled only so as to preclude forced eviction at the State’s hands.

Most importantly, the day underscored the how common property-related insecurities were. So few plots have been titled. Many occupants not only lack that basic legal protection, they also lack the tools and capacity to obtain it. One man tells us that he had purchased a future morsel from a man who had purchased the customary right to title the lot in its entirety. The vendor has since died, and this occupant is now clueless as to the location of the documents he would need to title his morsel.

Others have begun the titling process. The process, even after recent reforms, remains cumbersome and expensive. One resident, lured into hope by his neighbour’s success story, has taken the first steps and expects the process to take six months (as per the government’s half serious promise). Down the way, one family had invested its hopes in a sponsor, an individual who undergoes the titling process on behalf of another in exchange for a portion of the resulting securitized property. Three years have passed and no title has yet been received. The sponsor has been happy to live and farm his share of the land and to blame bureaucratic hurdles for his own lack of follow-through.

A kind of property anxiety is thus widespread – as it should be in a State where the threat of forced eviction looms large – and while it may encourage residents to undertake the titling marathon, it risks over-simplifying the life of property norms to the question of “is this property securitized, or not?” Although, it is interesting that, of all the criteria on which the UK-based NGO selects the recipients of its model houses, that is not one of them.

 Par: Éloïse Ouellet-Décoste

Je dois avouer que je n’ai jamais été passionné des questions foncières. Que ce soit le cours de Droit des Biens ou de  Common Law Property, je n’y trouvais pas d’intérêt particulier. Pourtant, depuis que je suis au Cambodge, j’ai  l’impression de ne m’intéresser qu’à ça, la terre et les enjeux fonciers. J’imagine que c’est du au fait qu’ici il n’y a pas  vraiment de régime de propriété ou du moins, celui qui existe est très imparfait, ce qui ouvre la porte à beaucoup d’abus  et offre très peu de sécurité à ceux qui sont propriétaires. On est donc loin des questions du fond servant et des droits  des copropriétaires…et autres « technicalités » existants dans un régime de propriété bien établit.

Pour réellement comprendre le bordel foncier qui existe aujourd’hui au Cambodge, il faut remonter dans le temps  jusqu’au année 1970, durant le régime des Khmer Rouge. Comme l’explique si bien le Père Ponchaud dans son percutant livre « Cambodge Année Zéro », les Khmers Rouge ont mis en pratique à la sauce Khmer les idéologies communistes Soviet et Maoïste dans leur version la plus extrême. C’est-à-dire qu’ils ont poussé à bout ses idéologies dans leur logique interne. Ainsi, puisque la ville était considérée comme corrompue, Phnom Penh et les autres villes du Cambodge ont été évacués dans les jours suivants la victoire des Khmers Rouge en 1975. Des milliers de personnes ont été forcé de quitter leur maison  et leurs biens et de partir, à pied, vers la campagne pour y travailler la terre. En campagne, la propriété privé a été complétement abolit et rendu illégale pour faire place à la production collective, dirigé par l’Angkar, l’organisation centrale. Bref, entre 1975 et 1979, le Régime des Khmer Rouge a complétement anéanti le régime de propriété. Et depuis cette époque, le Cambodge tente en vain de ressusciter son système d’enregistrement des propriétés foncières.

En 1992, une première loi est entrée en vigueur, reconnaissant le droit de tous les Cambodgiens de posséder et vendre leur terre. Puis en 2001, une nouvelle Land Law a vue le jour. Cette loi devait encadrée les droits de propriétés fonciers au Cambodge, tant la propriété privé que public, résidentielle, commerciale et agriculturale, les droits de propriétés collectifs des communautés autochtones et des sites religieux. De plus,  à l’article 5, la 2001 Land Law garantie que nul ne peut être privé de ses droits de propriété, sauf si une telle expropriation est nécessaire pour l’intérêt publique et qu’une compensation juste et équitable a été préalablement accordée. Sur papier, les lois foncières sont bien établit, cohérente et en accord avec les droits de la personne. Par contre, la réalité est toute autre.

Le défi principal était de faciliter l’enregistrement des droits fonciers de ceux occupant et utilisant la terre depuis des années sans aucun titre officiel. En 2002, le Land Management and Administration Project (LMAP) a été mis sur pied par le Gouvernement du Cambodge avec le support financier et technique de la Banque Mondiale et des gouvernements Allemand, Finlandais et Canadien. L’objectif premier du LMAP était d’assister le gouvernement dans l’implantation des provisions de la nouvelle loi visant à réduire la pauvreté, promouvoir la stabilité sociale et stimuler le développement économique. Pour y parvenir, le LMAP visait à améliorer la sécurité des droits fonciers et à promouvoir le développement d’un marché immobilier dynamique. Cela dit, 10 ans ont passé depuis que LMAP a vue le jour et, pourtant, l’élite Cambodgien continue à s’enrichir en vendant la terre et les ressources naturelles du pays, alors que les pauvres sont du plus en plus exclus des bénéfices de la propriété. Les familles sans titre foncier ne parviennent pas à en obtenir, même après 10 ou même 20 ans d’occupation, demeurant ainsi extrêmement vulnérable aux expropriations. De plus, mêmes les familles possédant des titres fonciers sont victimes d’évictions forcés et d’appropriation de leur terre, sans compensation et sous pressions et menaces incessantes. Les riches ont mis le Cambodge en vente et en profitent pendant que les pauvres en subissent brutalement les conséquences.

Suite à l’entrée en vigueur de la loi de 2001, deux nouveaux mécanismes visant à promouvoir le développement du pays et à réduire la pauvreté ont été élaboré. D’abord, pour les régions urbaines, les Social Land Concession (SLC), un mécanisme légal permettant le transfert des propriétés étatiques aux communautés pauvres pour des fins sociales, soit résidentielle ou agraire. Ensuite, les Economic Land Concession (ELC), pour les zones rurales. Ce deuxième mécanisme légal fut mis sur pied pour permettre le transfert des propriétés foncières étatiques à des compagnies privées pour l’exploitation agro-industriel.

Cela dit, les dernières années ont su démontrer que ces deux mécanismes ont plutôt été conçus pour faciliter l’expropriation des pauvres occupant des terres potentiellement lucratives au profit des compagnies privés, et tout ça au nom du « développement ». Suite à l’établissement des SLCs, le gouvernement annonça son intention d’en établir 4 là où habitaient déjà des communautés urbaines. Et les années qui suivirent témoignèrent des vrais intentions du gouvernement : démanteler les bidonvilles et déplacer les communautés pauvres en périphéries de la ville (là où les sites de relocations sont dépourvus de tout service et les conditions de vies déplorables) pour ensuite transférer les droits de propriétés à des compagnies privés pour des projets lucratifs. De plus, dans les campagnes, de nombreuses ELCs ont été accordés dans des aires protégées. Ainsi, non seulement les ELCs privent des communautés rurales pauvres des terres dont ils dépendent pour survivre depuis des générations, mais en plus, elles accélèrent la déforestation, facilitant la transformation des riches forêts cambodgiennes en monoculture intensive de caoutchouc et de sucre.

Voici quelques statistiques pas mal épouvantables. Entre 2003 et 2008, LICADHO estime que 53,758 familles ont été victime d’abus de droit de la personne liés à la terre, soit éviction forcé, appropriation de leur terre ou destruction de leur propriété. Et le nombre de famille nouvellement affecté ne fait qu’accélérer à chaque année. Déjà 2 millions d’hectares ont été transféré à des compagnies privées sous les mécanismes de concessions foncières et, de ce nombre, 700,000 hectares ont été transférés en 2011. En d’autres mots, la moitié des concessions ont eu lieu en un an ! Ceci laisse présager le pire pour les années à venir. Déjà, des rumeurs cours que le terrain sur lequel repose le stage olympique de Phnom Penh sera concédé à une compagnie privée de développement immobilier. Cet énorme stade est non seulement un lieu hautement fréquenté par tous les résidents de la ville pour y faire leurs activités physiques quotidiennes, mais il s’agit aussi d’un des seuls lieux publics  encore accessible sans frais. Phnom Penh n’a pas de parcs et très peu d’espace où relaxer et s’amuser entre amis ou en famille. La disparition du stage Olympique aurait des répercussions importantes sur la vie collective des citadins.

Suite  à la violence résultant des évictions forcés des premiers mois de 2012, notamment la mort par balle d’une jeune adolescente de 14 ans dans la province de Kratie durant une éviction forcées, le Premier Ministre Hun Sen annonça, au mois de Mai dernier, un moratoire sur les concessions foncières. Pourtant, à peine 1 mois et demi plus tard, déjà 4 nouvelles ECLs avaient été accordés, chacune d’entres elles dans une zone protégée : 8,200 hectares dans le Kulen Promtep Wildlife Sanctuary; 9,688 hectares dans le Parc National de Kirirom; 9,068 hectares dans le Phnom Prich Wildlife Sanctuary; et 9,000 hectares dans le Lumphat Wildlife Sanctuary, pour un total de 35,000 hectares. Et bien sur, le gouvernement nie avoir violé son propre moratoire.

Comme si tout ceci n’était pas assez, le gouvernement a présenté récemment le brouillon d’une nouvelle loi sur la gestion et l’utilisation des terres agricoles. Deux aspects de ce nouveau projet de loi sont particulièrement troublant compte tenu du contexte actuel au Cambodge où la violence et les abus des droits de la personne reliés aux enjeux fonciers sont à la hausse. D’une part, si adoptée, cette nouvelle loi créera des « Agricultural Development Areas », i.e. la collectivisation de tous les terres d’une certaine région si une majorité (non-définit dans la loi) de propriétaire foncier votent pour. Par conséquence, tous les propriétaires de la région, tant ceux pour que ceux contre, seront forcés de participer au plan de développement imposé par le gouvernement, à défaut de quoi ils risqueront la prison. De plus, aucune provision de la loi ne prévoit un mécanisme pour mettre fin au ADAs. D’autres part, la loi établira des sanctions pénales allant jusqu’à 1 an d’emprisonnement pour ceux qui ne respecteront pas la loi, ou quelques sous-décrets promulguer sous cette loi. De plus, une autre provision prévoit que tout acte visant à faire obstruction à un fonctionnaire dans l’exercice de ses fonctions sous cette loi sera considéré une offense criminelle passible d’une sanction pénale. Ainsi, un fermier voulant s’opposer à la création d’un ADA afin de protéger son droit de propriété privée s’exposerait aux risques d’être reconnu coupable d’entrave à la loi et d’emprisonnement.

Ce projet de loi comporte un bon nombre d’autres provisions troublant qui risqueront de compromettre les droits de propriétés des fermiers et d’élargir la marge de manœuvre pour ceux qui souhaitent s’approprier par la force les terres d’autrui . Je vous en épargne les détails, mais si vous souhaitez en savoir davantage, voici un excellent rapport de LICADHO sur ce nouveau projet de loi : http://www.licadho-cambodia.org/reports/files/169LICADHOBriefingDraftAgriculturalLaw-English.pdf. Cependant, ce qui est le plus choquant est de constater à quel point le gouvernement n’a aucune intention réel de mettre en application les provisions du 2001 Land Law qui visent à faciliter l’accès aux droits de propriétés des pauvres et ré-établir un régime de propriété foncière favorisant la sécurité d’occupation des terres aux populations les plus vulnérables. Jusqu’à date, le LMAP (financé en partie par le gouvernement Canadien), visant à enregistrer les titres de propriétés, n’a fait que formaliser les inégalités.  Et c’est bien entendu la rhétorique du développement qui est constamment utilisée pour justifier ces abus.

By Chris Durrant

I’ve never read The Trail by Kafka. I tried once in middle school, but stopped, because I found it confusing and unpleasant, which I’ve subsequently learned was kind of the point. Still, I felt sure today in using the word Kafkaesque to describe what was going on, if not from my point of view, then certainly for my client.

This morning I received notice that there was a bail hearing to be run today. I began getting ready by interviewing the client, creating a release plan and making sure sureties and witnesses would arrive at court. This process usually lasts through lunch (today I ate some yogurt covered raisins, a can of V8 and a pecan tart while on the phone) but I was ready to go at the court at 1:30. Usually the Justice of Peace court deals exclusively with bail hearings in the afternoon, but today there was a trial. I sat patiently through the trial, watching with interest as lawyers cross-examined witnesses. Now while it is great for me to get to watch a defense lawyer get an RCMP officer to admit it is hard to get an actual sense of the sobriety of a citizen they don’t know, I feel bad for my client, who had been moved from a small cell in the RCMP detachment to a small cell in the court house, and who didn’t know when she’d get to appear before the court or even what time it was, besides from when I slipped out of the courtroom to tell her I thought it would only be half an hour longer.

Unfortunately, once the trial was finished, the Crown lawyer and myself were informed by the clerk that there were no bail hearings on the docket. As both of us had received disclosure in morning, we were quite surprised. My client was brought into the courtroom, where I had to explain to her that it appeared while the paperwork for her bail hearing had been sent to the Crown and myself, it had not been sent to the Court. While the Crown and I were happy to lend the court our copies of the information, that was not an option because documents proved to the Court have to be sworn to, and neither of our disclosures were signed. While the Crown was very helpfully trying to arrange for the RCMP to send the documents up to the court, the Justice of the Peace decided that as there were no matters on the docket before her (and that it was around four o’clock) she would close court.

If this whole process sounds confusing, it is. I can only imagine how hellish it must be when you are hoping to get out on bail. After the JP left, the court room was a tangle of lawyers, law students, law clerks and an RCMP officer talking about whether there was anything to be done. I tried to explain to my client what was going on, while at the same time hoping to have some matter to discuss with anyone in the courtroom, because explaining to someone that they’ll have to spend the night in prison because of a paperwork mix-up is something you really want to do as little as possible. On top of that, we needed to sort through whether she would be allowed to spend the night in the women’s correctional facility, or whether she would have to go back to the RCMP detachment for the night. The difference between the two is large. The women’s facility, while still a prison, is at least a place designed for people to stay for an extended period of time. The RCMP detachment cells are small concrete affairs, where prisoners are given a microwave Hungary-man dinner at lunch and supper (why breakfast is not provided is an alarming question at best) and mattresses and toilet paper are given out to the prisoners based on some criteria I have yet to figure out (assuming its not arbitrary). Obliviously my client did not want to go back to the RCMP detachment. To be able to go to the women’s facility however, their needs to be a signed remand warrant, which is usually signed when someone looses their bail hearing. As we didn’t have a bail hearing, there was no remand warrant. Eventually someone with the authority to sign a remand warrant was found, but even with that document, it was no guaranteed that my client would get to go to the women’s facility, because they generally don’t do one-day intakes. The RCMP however, said they would ask. I will find out tomorrow morning where my client spent to night when we appear before the court in the morning.

Now with the help of practiced lawyers, both the Crown and defense lawyers from my office, I understood what was going on today, and felt I was able to advocate as best as possible for my client. However, for my client, she told me she didn’t really understand the reasons for what was happening, and I wouldn’t blame her if she can’t tell whether I’m doing a good job or not. I try to be empathic, and explain as simply as I can what’s happening. However, I can’t imagine what it is like to be told she can’t have her hearing because there was a problem with paperwork, the Justice of the Peace went home, and the she might have to spend the night alone in a concrete room because it’s only one night. If not Kafkaesque, I’m sure the words arbitrary and unfeeling apply well to the process.

The irony here is that someone can be denied bail if their release would cast doubt on the administration of justice. I’m certain my client now has her doubts about the administration of justice, but nothing about what happened to her today will work in her favour tomorrow.

Also confusing and troubling, the possibly unprecedented return of ice to Frobisher Bay in August. This prevents the sea-lift from unloading its goods, and has temporarily ruined clam season, which is a free source of food (which can be frozen and kept year long)

By Miatta Gorvie

The term “persons with disabilities” is a capacious term indeed, intended to capture the realities of a huge array of people’s lives. Somehow, it refers to an amputee begging in downtown Kampala and a person with mental health challenges languishing in prison while awaiting bail in a prison up-country; a girl who was fortunate enough to have been sent to a school for the blind or deaf and another who was left at home because of the lack of access to schooling for children with developmental disabilities. Legal Action for Persons with Disabilities – Uganda (LAPD) provides free and sustainable legal aid and human rights protection to the members of any and all of these communities of persons with disabilities (PWDs).

Access to justice for Uganda’s disabled is hindered at many turns. First and foremost is the fact that they are disproportionately more likely to live in poverty, as a result of systemic barriers to education and employment. There is no government assistance available for the disabled and so those who cannot work are dependent on family to fulfil their needs; the least fortunate are those that you see dotting the streets, begging for the goodwill of strangers. Even those who do have the resources to bring their cases to court will often be confronted by justice sector officials who do not understand the particularities of the lives of PWDs.

Uganda has a relatively robust disabilities rights regime, in terms of legislation. Not only has Uganda signed on to the 2006 Convention on the Rights of Persons With Disabilities, it has also domesticated it’s commitment with provisions in its 1995 Constitution and the Persons with Disabilities Act of 2006, among other acts and policies. However, while the legal instruments are in place, in substance they are often minimalist and incomprehensive.

This legislation is a great achievement for a poor country with an unconsolidated democracy, but laws are only part of the question of achieving dignity for PWDs. Disability rights, perhaps more than many others, is a fertile testing ground for the balancing of rights and other priorities. Indeed, the term “reasonable accommodation,” which has recently been extended to the question of multiculturalism in Quebec, finds its origins in the disability literature. Reasonable accommodation is the idea that “necessary and appropriate modification and adjustments not imposing a disproportionate or undue burden, where needed in a particular case” should be made to ensure that PWDs enjoy their rights and freedoms on an equal basis with others.[1] For example in employment, should an employee with a physical disability need a different chair from the model used in the office, it would be considered unreasonable for the person to lose their job over the purchase of a chair and the employer is legally required to make the adjustment.

Disability rights are constantly framed as being in competition with resources. In a developing economy like Uganda, what can it mean for children with disabilities to have the right to public education, the same public education system that can barely pay its teachers or supply learning materials? While the problems are much more visible here, this is hardly a problem reserved to poor countries.

This spring, I travelled to Ottawa with a group of McGill students to hear the opening arguments for the Moore case. As a boy, Jeffrey Moore suffered from severe dyslexia but was able to participate in the public school system because the division had a program for students with his particular needs. When this program was cut for budgetary reasons, his father was forced to place him in a private school, at great cost, and he sued the BC government for what he perceives as an undue hardship. In the opening arguments, the province submitted that Jeffrey should not be compared to other students in the public school system but other special needs students in the system. Framed that way, Jeffrey and all other students with intellectual disabilities were given an equal opportunity to access a “general education.” Moore was seeking an accommodation to access the mainstream service whereas the government defined his request as a specialized education service. Embarrassingly, the province also claimed that there is no right for a student to learn how to read, because even public school students without disabilities have difficulty reading.

When a G-8 country shrugs at disability rights under the guise of “budgetary constraints,” the prospects for PWDs in the developing world seem dire. The dominant discourse reflects the way in which disability rights are still seen as second-tier rights or aspirations that will come to fruition at some uncertain point in the future when scarce resources are no longer an issue. McGill’s Frédéric Mégret has considered whether the CRPD simply affirms the idea that existing human rights apply to PWDs and reformulates existing human rights to acknowledge the particularities of PWDs’ experiences, or whether it actually goes as far as to extend existing rights and innovate so far as to create new rights with the realities of the disabled at their core. He finds the Convention to be a “very subtle mix of the old and the new, which confirms existing rights, even as it amplified upon, evolves from and departs from them in the sort of creative ways required by the issue of disability.”

I agree with Professor Mégret’s proposition, that the CRPD was an opportunity to make a statement about difference and pluralism, often thought of as running contrary to the universalism and equality inherent in the human rights project. However, I took on this internship partly as a challenge, to step out of the safe spaces of seminar courses and panel discussions and consider what “human rights” can possibly mean in the field. Therefore, as a result of my experiences doing legal aid for PWDs with LAPD this summer, I must reluctantly endorse the pedantic view of the Convention that the professor rejects, the one that considers the document to be an affirmation of restatement of the applicability of existing human rights to PWDs.

When faced with politicians and judges who already see rights for PWDs as “other” and as something to be addressed only after rights for the majority have been dealt with, it is not helpful for an advocate to make an argument about newness and plurality. It is likely preferable to submit that PWDs have the same general human right to education and that their requests for inclusion are only accommodations and not brand new rights. Would this framing not make it much easier to refute the “budgetary constraints” argument? It seems to me that when dealing with few resources and little audience time with decision-makers, the pragmatic route might be the most effective.

I hoped she would enjoy her gift, a traditional bowl of bowls made from local woods that I had picked out with the assistance of one of her close relatives. The occasion was significant and celebratory: Julienne Ayissi, the Court of Appeal justice who, on a parallel career track, acts as figurehead and chairperson of the CONGEH, was to be sworn in as a Councilor of the Supreme Court of Cameroon.

In broad strokes, the Supreme Court of Cameroon acts as the final appellate court in penal, administrative and civil matters. It also provides the final say for disputes governed by the state-recognized customary law.  The Supreme Court has also assumed jurisdiction over constitutional matters while President Biya and accomplices lag to establish the Constitutional Court envisioned in the Constitution.

Her house was hard to find. Towards the back end of a messy web of warped and deep-ridged mud roads – the kind that evidence the “informality” of the local housing – we would finally find a gated cement lot. Lawn chairs were being unloaded by the dozen, groups of women worked around mountains of fresh vegetables, while Mme Ayissi herself rushes to and fro, preparing herself for a meeting. “Everybody has taken this so seriously, I find it overwhelming,” she tells me, “It is not that big of a deal”. Her exasperation might have been expected. It is rumored that she has had to take out a loan to pay for all the gas consumed in traveling between preparatory meetings, where members of the judiciary, State officials, family members and even some village authorities have stressed the importance of her new position and of the values she should embody in her work at the country’s highest tribunal.

And, in spite of her humility, the appointment is significant. Ayissi is attentive to the needs and concerns of the landless and the vulnerable, particularly women infected or affected by HIV/AIDS. That kind of alignment is useful in a Court that has been known to have its way with the law, so to speak. In matters of family property and succession law, for instance, the Supreme Court has been known to ignore core, explicit Codal articles and to fabricate new rules or regimes un-tethered to either the Code’s provisions or to its evident philosophy. This assumed judicial liberty might well be rooted in a dissatisfaction with the Civil Code, which is, for most intents and purposes, the French Code Civile as it existed in 1960. It was originally adopted as a temporary, “gap filling” measure to hold the country over until the competent government bodies could enact a law proper to Cameroon. Some speculate that, in light of persistent legislative inaction, the Cameroonian judiciary has taken upon itself the task of adapting inherited foreign legal notions to local realities and philosophies. In any event, this assumed liberty makes the identity of the members of the Supreme Court all the more important.

After an official State ceremony oversaw the swearing in of all sitting magistrates, Ayissi was treated to two receptions, one for members of the legal community and another for family, neighbours and residents of Bana, her native community. Residents of Bana would impress upon her how she now represents Bana, and the Bamileke more generally, at the national stage. Her family would celebrate the success of one of their own, evidently satisfied with the kind of family status that will follow her appointment. Members of the CONGEH, also present, have reason to be excited as well. “She could one day become Minister of Justice!” says an elated colleague. For now, CONGEH stands to look more credible with a member of the Supreme Court at its helm, and can look to Ayissi’s appointment as a vindication of its philosophy and approach to development.

Her appointment does speak volumes of the relationship CONGEH has fostered with the Cameroonian government. Paul Biya would certainly not have seen a critic appointed to the country’s highest judicial body. But the CONGEH that I have been exposed to seeks more to assist the Government, and considers many elected representatives and government missives as partners. Colleagues of mine are proud that government officials have expressed a certain reliance on the contributions made by the CONGEH. Liaisons with government ministries in turn lend the organization some credibility. Moreover, having the attention of certain politically significant individuals allows the CONGEH to engage in more effective – and therefore more fund-worthy – advocacy work. No doubt, there are pervasive costs associated with aligning an NGO with a central African government. So it is a strange kind of accomplishment that, while some of the other human rights interns have served advocates that have been targeted by anxious governments, loathing dissent, CONGEH’s leading advocate was just promoted.

Par Éloïse Ouellet-Décoste

J`ai débuté ma journée en feuilletant le Code Criminel du Cambodge. Bon matin! Au premier coup d`œil, ce Code  Criminel n`a rien d`exceptionnel, il contient des crimes, des défenses, des circonstances aggravantes et atténuantes,  et la plupart des crimes et des sentences semblent raisonnables, comparable a ce que nous avons au Canada. Bien sur,  certaines nouveautés me sautent aux yeux, tel “Article 433: Régicide”…je n`ai jamais entendu parler de Régicide…et  lorsque je tourne les pages, je comprends pourquoi, il s`agit de l`assassinat d`un Roi…Cela dit, une fois que je regarde  un peu plus en profondeur son contenu, un nombres d`articles me font sourciller.

Le but de cette lecture matinale est de répertorier les articles les plus souvent utilisés contre les défenseurs des droits de  la personne. Au Cambodge, malgré le fait que l’indépendance et l’impartialité du système judiciaire sont garanties par la Constitution, les tribunaux demeurent une arme de choix contre ceux qui dérangent le gouvernement. Activistes et militants se portant à la défense des droits de la personne se retrouvent donc fréquemment devant la justice et, un certains nombres d’articles du Code Criminel à teneur assez vague sont déployés contre eux afin de les dissuader de continuer leurs travails. Les accusations les plus communes : incitation à commettre un acte criminel, diffamation, insulte, attaque aux travail des autorités, destruction de propriété. Et ces provisions du Code Criminel, qui sont à prime abord questionnable compte tenu leur définition vague, sont appliqué de façon très libérale par la Cour qui se permet de redéfinir les provisions pénales à sa guise afin de mettre des bâtons judiciaires dans les roues de ceux qui dérangent les intérêts personnels et commerciales du Gouvernement et des Compagnies privés proche du régime.

Pourtant, alors que l’appareille judiciaire est très efficace contre les défenseurs des droits de la personne, celui-ci est complètement inadéquat lorsque ce sont les victimes qui demandent justice. Compte tenu du manque d’Indépendance des tribunaux, ce n’est pas surprenant, mais ça reste excessivement dérangeant, surtout vue la violence perpétuée par la police et l’armée ces derniers temps. Depuis le début de l’année 2012, la police et l’armée ont ouvert le feu à plusieurs reprises contre des manifestants pacifiques, sans qu’aucune investigation indépendant s’en suive. En Mai dernier, une adolescente de 14 ans a été tué par balle alors que l’armée a ouvert le feu contre des villageois durant une opération d’éviction. Plutôt que de chercher à éclairer la situation et amener en justice les responsables de cette tragédie, le gouvernement a plutôt cherché à justifier l’incident en expliquant que cette force létale était nécessaire pour freiner le plan sécessionniste des villageois…pourtant rien ne prouve qu’en tel plan existe, et même s’il existait, je doute que les coups de feu amélioreraient la situation.

L’impunité ne protège pas uniquement les forces armées, les personnes influentes aussi n’ont pas trop à craindre la justice. En Janvier dernier, alors que plus de 1,000 employés des manufactures du Manhattan Special Economic Zone manifestaient pour de meilleures conditions de travail, un homme a ouvert le feu sur la foule avant de s’enfuir en moto. L’homme, qui est en fait l’ancien gouverneur du district, a été accusé d’avoir causé des blessures non-intentionnelles, sans pourtant être arrêté. Trois jeunes ouvrières ont été grièvement blessé au haut du corps…L’impunité s’est ça aussi, être accusé d’un crime moindre que celui réellement perpétué.

Donc, voilà l’état de la justice au Cambodge. Les victimes n’y ont pas droit et les innocents en sont victimes. Bien que le Cambodge soit une démocratie en théorie, ou du moins, considérer comme un pays en transition vers la démocratie, mon expérience jusqu’à date me révèle tout à fait le contraire. Et il semblerait que la situation s’empire depuis quelques temps. En fait, les élections approchent et le Premier Ministre travaille très fort pour consolider son pouvoir. La répression des libertés fondamentales d’expression et d’association est une de ses stratégies préférées. Et tout ceux qui de proche ou de loin semble s’opposer au gouvernement écope.

Par exemple, la fin de semaine dernière, le propriétaire de la seule radio indépendante du Cambodge, Beehive Radio, a été arrêté deux jours après son retour au pays. Il est accusé, entre autres, de complot sécessionniste et risque jusqu’à 30 ans de prison. Étrangement,  cette arrestation survient un mois après que Radio Beehive ait diffusé sur ses ondes un reportage sur la poursuite pour crime contre l’humanité menée au Tribunal Pénale Internationale par le Khmer People Power Movement contre le gouvernement Cambodgien. Bien que le Cambodge possède une Loi sur la Presse qui contient des provisions pénales spécifiques pour les journalistes ayant enfreint à leur devoir, le gouvernement préfère ignorer la liberté de presse et promouvoir l’autocensure en envoyant un message très puissant à tous ceux qui croient encore en le devoir des journalistes dans une société démocratique.

En fait, en plus de la répression violente et de l’utilisation des tribunaux, le gouvernement utilise aussi la législature comme arme contre les critiques. Au courant des dernières années, le gouvernement a développé plusieurs nouvelles lois qui enfreignent les libertés fondamentales des Cambodgiens. En plus du nouveau Code Pénal, le gouvernement a mis sur pied une loi sur les Démonstrations Pacifiques qui entrave à la tenue de manifestation et rend très vulnérable leurs organisateurs. La nouvelle loi anti-corruption met les dénonciateurs dans une position très précaire si leurs accusations s’avèrent fausse, mais compte tenu de la partialité des tribunaux, on peut prévoir que les accusations incommodes seront soudainement déclarées fausses…De plus, trois lois sont actuellement en route, une loi sur les ONGs, une loi sur les syndicats et une « cyberlaw ». Bien qu’encore au stage préliminaire, les derniers brouillons de ces lois laissent présager le pire.

Tous ces développements récents sont assez curieux, compte tenu de l’approche des élections l’an prochain. Plusieurs spéculent sur la santé du Premier Ministre Hun Sen et y voient une dernière tentative de consolider son pouvoir avant de mourir…Le Cambodge n’est pas un pays très connu, et figure rarement à la une des journaux. Pourtant, un niveau politique, le Cambodge est d’une certaine façon comparable au monde arabe. Hun Sen est reconnu pour son langage incendiaire. À titre d’exemple, voici quelques charmants mots qu’il a prononcé récemment “I not only weaken the opposition, I’m going to make them dead … and if anyone is strong enough to try to hold a demonstration, I will beat all those dogs and put them in a cage.” Démocratique dit-on…Hun Sen fait aussi partie du club des dirigeants qui sont au pouvoir depuis plus de 10,000 jours. Faites le calcul…10,000 divisé par 365, ça fait beaucoup d’année ! Suite au printemps arabe, de nombreux dictateurs ont été déchus, réduisant la liste des membres du club des 10,000 jours à moins de 10 et Hun Sen en fait partie. Démocratique dit-on…Hun Sen possède aussi une fortune personnelle estimé à plus de $500 millions. Je doute qu’un simple salaire de Premier Ministre soit suffisant pour amasser une simple fortune, même pour les plus économes, et à voir les propriétés de Hun Sen, je doute que celui-ci soit très économe. Démocratique dit-on…

Bref, on oublie trop souvent le Cambodge, on ignore trop souvent ce qui se passe au Cambodge et pourtant, la situation se détériore et le gouvernement se raffermie, au détriment de la population, au détriment des droits de la personne. Malgré une des Constitutions les plus progressistes en Asie du Sud Est, le Cambodge est loin d’être un exemple d’un pays où règne la primauté du droit. Bien au contraire, au Cambodge l’État de droit se résume ainsi, tel que décrit par Phil Robertson, Directeur du Bureau d’Asie de Human Rights Watch, « The laws in Cambodia are what Hun Sen says they are, not what’s written down ».

By Jihyun Rosel Kim 

Before I began my internship, I was told it would involve mostly research. That statement is technically true – the majority of my time here was spent wrestling with Quicklaw, writing memos, or making information charts. However, one thing I’ve learned about the Legal Network is that it is truly committed to the issues identified in its mission statement, and will speak out in various ways.

1. Quiet action at the Court of Appeal

On June 15, staff of the Legal Network and other members of the community (including members of the Ontario Working Group on Criminal Law and HIV Exposure) participated in a “quiet action” campaign at the Ontario Court of Appeal. The Court was scheduled to hear an appeal on a case involving HIV status non-disclosure (R. v. M.), where both the Canadian HIV/AIDS Legal Network and HIV/AIDS Legal Clinic of Ontario (HALCO) were intervenors.

The "HIV Positive" action at the ON Court of Appeal

At trial, the judge ignored case law by not applying the significant risk test (i.e. a person living with HIV must disclose his/her status to the partner when the sexual activity poses a “significant risk of bodily harm”) set out in R. v. Cuerrier. Instead, he charged the defendant with aggravated sexual assault simply on the ground that the defendant did not disclose his status. Although the defendant stated he used a condom (which further diminishes the already-low risk of HIV transmission), the trial judge said it did not matter whether the sex was protected or not.

To demonstrate to the Court that people living with HIV and their allies were concerned about such overbroad use of criminal law, the Legal Network organized a t-shirt campaign—members showed up to the courtroom all wearing the same t-shirt with the logo “HIV Positive” at the front. There were about 18 people at court, and since the assigned courtroom for the hearing happened to be a smaller one, we effectively filled the gallery.

Unfortunately, the Court decided to stay the appeal, to wait for the Supreme Court decision on HIV non-disclosure (R. v. D.C.; R. v. Mabior) later this year. Even though it was a bit anti-climactic, one of the justices did take notice of the audience uniformly dressed in “HIV Positive” shirts to address us directly, and say that he realizes these issues are important and that he will make sure to rule on the issues carefully once the Supreme Court decision came down.

2. Action around cuts to refugee health care

At the end of April, Citizenship and Immigration Canada announced changes to the Interim Federal Health Program, which would effectively cut most supplemental health care benefits for refugee claimants, and all access to government-funded health care services for failed refugee claimants (who may reapply to stay in Canada under humanitarian and compassionate grounds). The only exception would be when the claimant’s health condition presented a “public health risk”—such as HIV. As of now, the public outcry seems to have made Kenney’s office backtrack a little bit from their initial cuts these days, but most of the cuts still remain.

On June 18—the national day of action to protect refugee health care—the Executive Director emailed everyone about the protest in Toronto, and encouraged everyone to attend the protest with him. So later on that day, I went to the Citizenship and Immigration Canada office on St. Clair Avenuewith a team of policy analysts and the ED of the Legal Network, and joined a few hundred people who were chanting “health care for refugees!”

—

Through participating in these actions, I’ve learned about the joys of being out on the streets with other people who believe in the same things as I do, which offers tremendous comfort in times where laws and policies seem to be going to a dark place. These experiences won’t appear on my CV as things I accomplished, but they nevertheless had a big impact on my outlook on activism and effective advocacy.

And for that intangible feeling of joy that came from connecting with other like-minded people who are committed to making things better, I am very grateful to the Legal Network.

By Roger Bill

It’s been over 2 months now since I’ve arrived in the Federal District of Mexico. The cultural shocks come less and less, my skin doesn’t burn so easily, I don’t mind the altitude when I run, and the chilangismos (local slang) roll easily off my tongue. As settled in as I feel, I’m often startled in my work by the large divide between the law on paper, and the reality in the streets.

In the day to day, this reality would be evident to any Canadian visitor like me, not just those working in human rights. Traffic laws are a great example. There are laws on the books, but what matters is what the other motorists are doing, not what colour the lights are. For example, I had a lively cab driver a couple of weeks ago. He was happy to be taking me and two friends across town for a decent fare. So, when a police officer pulled him over for running a red light and was at his window telling him he had to pay a fine and leave us to find another cab, what mattered was how quickly he could leave the police car in his tracks, not the picture of his car caught by the traffic camera.

After an adventurous flight from the police with my aggressive cabbie, I realized that what holds for cabbies holds for people with disabilities: there are laws on the books, but people will do what they can get away with.

Unfortunately for people with disabilities, the people bending the rules are their legal representatives, or public servants who don’t want to make reasonable accommodations for them, or administrators of psychiatric institutions where they are indefinitely detained.

A large part of my work in the first month of my arrival was creating this year’s Zero Project Report, a study of the implementation of the UN Convention on the Rights of People with Disabilities (CRPD). The study examines not only what legislative changes have been made in Mexico to bring the law in line with the convention, but what the practical reality of the implementation of the convention is. Sadly, the reality usually falls well short of the laudable goals and aspirational language of recent legislative reforms.

Disability Rights International advocates for the rights of people with disabilities, and particularly tries to attain the ideals promised by article 19 of the CRPD: to have people live inclusively in the community rather than in isolated institutions where they suffer abuse. The organization fights to have the reality of institutions mirror the rights guaranteed by law. This is a laudable goal and I’m very happy to participate in it through our different advocacy initiatives.

Currently we are trying to end institutional abuse in a Central American psychiatric hospital through motions before the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights. The abuse is terrible: people administered therapy without their consent, others locked up for life with no possibility to review their status and live again in the community, sexual abuse, human trafficking, and horrendous living conditions. We hope to stop the terrible abuse perpetrated by the institution. However, bringing about de-institutionalization is no mean feat. Realistically things won’t change overnight, and people with disabilities can do little to help themselves when they are locked up in psychiatric wards in deplorable conditions.

So, I’m very happy to be participating in a project to empower people with disabilities and give them the tools to change the situation in the hallways of hospitals. Along with pressuring the government to improve conditions and offer community service as DRI constantly does, we are attempting to reform the laws of legal capacity in Mexico so that people with disabilities can have more control over how they live their lives.

DRI is part of a working group composed of the National Council for the Development and Inclusion of People with Disabilities (CONADIS), Rehabilitation International, several strategic litigation firms which specialize in disability rights, and other invited experts. The project aims to propose amendments to the civil code of the Federal District, as well as proposing a draft legislation creating a supported decision making scheme. Through these two changes, we hope to create a strong example for the other Mexican states to follow. It is a monumental task, and our proposal may not get adopted on its first pass in the national assembly, but it is step in the right direction.

A report by the Secretary General of the UN on the progress of efforts to ensure the full recognition and enjoyment of the human rights of persons with disabilities [A/58/181] perhaps says it best:

“The right to recognition as a person before the law is often neglected in the context of mental health. The concept of guardianship is frequently used improperly to deprive individuals with an intellectual or psychiatric disability of their legal capacity without any form of procedural safeguards. Thus, persons are deprived of their right to make some of the most important and basic decisions about their life on account of an actual or perceived disability without a fair hearing and/or periodical review by competent judicial authorities. The lack of due process guarantees may expose the individual whose capacity is at stake to several possible forms of abuse. An individual with a limited disability may be considered completely unable to make life choices independently and placed under “plenary guardianship”. Furthermore, guardianship may be improperly used to circumvent laws governing admission in mental health institutions, and the lack of a procedure for appealing or automatically reviewing decisions concerning legal incapacity could then determine the commitment of a person to an institution for life on the basis of an actual or perceived disability.”

Throughout Latin America and much of the world, the laws governing legal capacity must be reformed to protect the rights of people with disabilities. Hopefully, Mexico City can take a leadership position for the rest of the country, and eventually for other nations in Latin America.