5A
OPINIONS/ The Charlotte Post
January 18,1996
Who will
challenge
King Richard?
D.G. Martin
What is going to happen in North Carolina's
Secretary of State's race next fall?
Ordinarily that question would draw a big
yawn this time of year—even from the most
committed political junkies. Members of the
Council of State (like the Secretary of State,
Commissioner of Agriculture, etc.) are some of
our most interesting, colorful, and talented
political figures.
But elections to those offices usually don't
stir up a lot of interest.
This year it is different.
Why?
First, Richard Petty is racing.
The "King" of stock car racing is running for
Secretary of State as a Republican. He is popu
lar. He has a loyal — some would say fanatical-
-following. Any other politician would give any
thing to have so many fans.
Maybe your memory is better than mine, but
I can't remember when such a popular sports
or entertainment figure was running for state
wide office in North Carohna.
So, the question on the table is, how will
Petty's star quality translate into votes at the
polls in November? More about this later.
The second factor that makes this year's con
test interesting is that the current Secretary of
State, Democrat Rufus Edmisten, is not run
ning. If Edmisten had run, the election would
interesting enough. He would have given the
"King" a good battle. He has a wide and loyal
following. It might not be as large or passion
ate as Petty's. But Edmisten's group is much
more experienced politically. Edmisten has run
j several state wide races — and lost only one.
Jim Martin beat him in the
1984 governor's election,
' With those two
j strong candidates
I running, it would
; be a hard fought,
* classic battle.
But, Edmisten's
unanticipated
withdrawal
makes the selec
tion of
Democratic can
didate for
Secretary of State
as the second most
interesting state-wide
contest in the upcoming May primary. The
first, of course, is the race for the Republican
gubernatorial nomination.
If you could make the call for the Democrats,
who would you recruit to run against Petty?
Some other popular race car driver? Or
maybe another popular sports or entertain
ment figure. Andy Griffin. Michael Jordan.
Coach Dean Smith. Nice thoughts, but beheve
me, none of them is going to trade what they
are doing for the fun of trudging from one
county barbecue to another and spending mil
lions of dollars.
The Democratic seers
are saying their party
needs to run somebody
who is strong in areas
where Petty might be per
ceived as weak. If the
Democratic candidate were a
strong experienced manager
with financial and legal experi
ence, he would have an edge on Petty, whose
strength is in other areas. This Democratic
candidate would then try to convince the public
that managing the state's records and an over
seeing the state's regulation of business
processes and financing required a solid profes
sional - rather than a popular but, arguably,
inexperienced star attraction.
Another desirable quality for a Democratic
candidate: being a woman. Then, those voters
who think women should be better represented
in the statewide offices might have a good rea
son to pass by the popular Petty. (Other than
judges, none of the existing statewide elected
officials are women.)
How would a professional woman with good
managerial experience do agadnst the popular
Petty?
It is fun to speculate. But, honestly, I don't
know.
As interesting and exciting as the race
between Petty and the Democratic candidate
will be, and as much as we discuss it, the final
result will be determined mostly by the success
of the candidate's political party in November
-just like the other Council of State races.
If there is a Republican landslide this fall.
Petty will probably be Secretary of State even
if the Democratic candidate is well-qualified,
attractive, and runs a great race.
And if the Democrats get out a big vote. Petty
will probably lose even if the Democratic candi
date is not a "perfect" one.
DG MARTIN is vice president for public
affairs for the University of North Carolina sys
tem.
Nigerian executions: Justice or tyranny?
Nigerian executions: Justice
or t}rranny?
—By Askla Muliamniad
NATIONAL NEWSPAPER
PUBLISHERS ASSOCIA
TION
An intense international
political storm is swirling
around the military-led gov
ernment of Nigeria, because it
carried out death sentences on
nine activists, members of the
minority Ogoni people from
the oil-rich Rivers State on
Nov. 10.
Despite condemnation, bans,
expulsions, calls for interna
tional sanctions and a boycott
of Nigerian oil exports, gov
ernment officials are stead
fast, and relatives of the men
whose deaths were allegedly
ordered by writer Ken Saro-
Wiwa, defend the gov
ernment's action. He
and eight others were
hanged at a prison in
Port Harcourt, in
Ogoniland, in the
Southwest region of the
country.
South African
President Nelson
Mandela, Zimbabwe's
President Robert
Mugabe, British Prime
Minister John Major,
and U.S. President Bill
Clinton have been
joined by several other
world leaders, as well
as by Amnesty
International, in con
demning the executions
of the nine, who were
not allowed to appeal
their death sentences.
Nigeria has withdrawn
its ambassadors from
the U.S. and most
European capitals,
which quickly withdrew
their own representa
tives following the exe
cutions.
"I support, 100 percent, the
decision of the government of
Nigeria to dispense punish
ment quickly for its justified
decision," Desmond Orage
said recently at a S3rmposium
on Nigeria at the Carnegie
Endowment for International
Peace. His father. Chief
Samuel Orage, his uncle,
Theophilus Orage, as well as
Chief Edward Kobani and
Albert Badey were murdered
and their bodies were inciner
ated May 21,1994 by a mob
allegedly instigated by Mr.
Saro-Wiwa, an internationally
respected writer.
Mr. Saro-Wiwa, "was not
arrested for any crusade in
favor of environmental protec
tion," Zubair Kazaure,
Nigeria's Ambassador to the
U.S. told reporters at a press
conference the day of the exe
cutions. "Nor was he censored
for promoting the legitimate
interests of the Ogoni people.
(He) was arrested, fairly tried,
and duly convicted for his
proven involvement in the
premeditated, brutal, and
cold-blooded murder of four
Ogoni leaders who dared to
oppose his violent confronta
tion agEiinst" the government.
Beginning in 1993, Mr. Saro-
Wiwa organized a militant
cadre within the originally
non-violent Movement for the
Survival of the Ogoni People
(MOSOP). That faction vio
lently opposed the June 12,
1993 presidential election,
burning and looting the homes
of other Ogoni who did not
comply, eventually sparking
riots throughout the region
and the destruction of a $30
million oil facility; and it insti
gated bloody wars with the
neighboring Andoni, Ndoki,
"I support, 100 percent,
the decision of the govern
ment of Nigeria to dis
pense punishment quickly
for its justified decision”
-Desmond Orage
and Asa peoples.
Several of MOSOP's found
ing elders objected to Mr.
Saro-Wiwa's growing personal
ambitions and to his secret
business arrangements with
oil companies. They also
objected to the increasingly
violent tactics of his militant
National Youth Council of
Ogoni People (NYCOP).
The tensions erupted in
October, 1993 following a
three-day Ogoni-Andoni
"peace conference." After
attending and actively partici
pating in three-days of negoti
ations, Mr. Saro Wiwa myste
riously disappeared from the
meeting, reportedly through a
bathroom window, just when
the accord was to be signed.
He later denounced the agree
ment, and accused his fellow
members of the Ogoni delega
tion of selling out by putting
their personal "prejudices"
ahead of their commitment to
the "triumph of Ogoni."
Originally, 15 people were
charged with the four counts
of murder. The public tri
bunal, which was monitored
by Amnesty International,
Greenpeace, the United
Nations and other organiza
tions, found six of the defen
dants not guilty. At the trial,
five eyewitnesses (19 witness
es total) testified that immedi
ately before the slayings, Mr.
Saro-Wiwa, in a rage, told
thousands of supporters at a
rally to "deal with the vul
tures," specifically naming the
victims and others he charged
with accepting money from
Shell and Chevron oil compa
nies and from the federal gov
ernment. Several Ogoni had
already been named vultures
in previous death warrants,
cartoons, and a "news flash."
The victims were gath
ered at a well-pubhcized
Council of Ogoni Elders,
nearby. Eyewitness
accounts indicate that a
mob of 2,000 attacked
the meeting where the
victims were beaten
with clubs and
machetes, and that all
who were listed on Mr.
Saro-Wiwa's "news
flash" received fatal
blows, while others at
the meeting who had not
been marked for death
were released, some
unharmed, others sim
ply assaulted. The three-
member Court, com
posed of two civilian jus
tices and one military
person,
"I flew to Nigeria after
hundreds of phone calls
from my home in Los
Angeles to family mem
bers in Nigeria," to
investigate the killings
on his own, Mr. Orage
said. Despite death
threats he and his wife
received in this country unless
he abandoned his investiga
tion, he persisted. "I came out
believing that Ken Saro-Wiwa
was responsible for the mas
sacre of my father. We believe
justice was served.”
Other Rivers State neigh
bors of the Ogoni also criti
cized Mr. Saro-Wiwa's vio
lence-prone leadership. "Ken
Saro-Wiwa has a hidden agen
da,” Joseph Okere, President
of the Ndoki and Asa National
Congress said in a newspaper
advertisement accusing him of
trjdng to destroy the Nigerian
federal union last August. "He
is dreaming of an Eldorado
empire called Ogoni Kingdom
where he will be the head of
State. This is why MOSOP
has been involved in expan
sionist aggression to annex
other oil producing communi
ties around Ogoni. We wish to
state that Ken Saro-Wiwa-led
Generating our own
grits and groceries
By William Reed j
NATIONAL NEWSPAPER PUBLISHERS ASSOCIATION '
Are white people in a conspiratorial effort to
keep us down? Or, is it possible that we each have
our collective destinies in our own hands, or, at
least, in each of our pocketbooks. Who among us
can deny that if we really want to break the
effects of racism and discrimination, we could eas
ily do it via our economic power? If we started off
1996 in a new economic mind set and looked at
what minority groups like Jews and Asians have
done with their collective actions and stop think
ing of ourselves as "poor" and "minority," we will
all recognize what it mews to say that our $400
billion annual income is higher that the gross
national product of 94 percent of the world's
industrialized and developing countries.
But if black people really want financial inde
pendence and economic development, we are
going to have to taike collective action. When we
understand that our present situation can be.
traced to choices we made in the past, we can use
this knowledge to position ourselves to make the
choices that guarantee a promising future. It's not
as if we each don't know what the real problem is,
rather it is refusing to take responsibility for our
own actions. It is easier for us to blame the white
man for our situation than it is to take up our
own cross and carry it. From Chicago's West Side
to South Central Los Angeles, we prefer to "diss"
white, Arab, Asian and Jewish merchants for dis
respecting us because it is easier than taking col
lective actions through our churches and clubs
and build our own shopping centers and commer
cial strips. Each and every African American,
from Boston to Bakersfield, knows that we are
going to have to improve our financial and eco
nomic presence in the American, and world, com
munity or we all will continue, like lemmings, to
sink into the sea of decay.
White people have a right to feel they've done as
much "affirmative action" as they should when
they look around their offices and factory floors
and see numerous black faces. What they don't
see are the other two-thirds of African Americans
still looking for jobs, housing and career opportu
nities. What they do see are our self-appointed
poverty pimp leaders continually asking them for
another handout to "help us lift our boats off the
bottom" of the country's economic rungs.
Structures such as a display of black collective
economic development will manifest itself to the
world when we own state-of-the-art shopping cen
ters. We need retail and wholesale distribution
processes that are owned by numerous groups,
organizations and individuals among us, and a
presence in the revenue stream that bring cars,
clothing, computers, com flakes and other items
into black households. But the problem with
blacks who've reached middle-class status, as well
as those of us who're not been as economically for
tunate, is that we are individuals who collectively
don’t see the need to be a part of any collective of
black economics.
Even though a larger segment of Black America,
than any other group, is collectively at the bottom
of the nation's economic barrel, with all of its
problems of crime, violence and lack of basic First
World facilities, we manifest our collective con
sumer power and lack of unity of purpose like
crabs in a barrel as "independent" consumers. As
a group, we spend 95 percent of our income out
side our communities. Asians, less than 10 per
cent of our size, spend almost 90 percent of their
income with each other. As a people, if we are to
survive into the 21st century, we must do a better
job of laying a solid economic foundation for gen
erations of our kind to come.
Judges can fall victim to injudicious behavior
By Walter R. Mears
THE ASSOCIATED PRESS
WASHINGTON - By title, job description,
the solemnity of the black robe, the authority
of the gavel, judges are cast as figures a step
beyond everyday behavior. But they aren't
immune from job stress that can build to the
point of angry outbursts from the bench.
“Bench stress," the American Bar
Association Journal calls it
in an account suggesting a
growing recognition of the
problem and the need to
redress it when it happens.
The marathon trial and
acquittal of O.J. Simpson
have put a focus on what's
happening in American courtrooms.
Compared with conduct described in the ABA
study. Judge Lance Ito was a judicial saint.
In the study, Pamela Coyle tells of an angry
Philadelphia judge who threw a glass of water
at a lawyer and one in Louisiana who told a
witness that in his courtroom he was God.
A Long Island judge sent unsigned letters
and faxes ridiculing and at times threatening
an attorney with whom he'd had political dif
ferences.
With confidence in the judicial system shak
en even before the Simpson trial, conduct
described as “black robe fever" by the presi
dent of the National Judicial College in Reno,
Nev., can only worsen the problem.
“This whole area of demeanor is so impor
tant," Judge V. Robert Payant told Coyle.
“There is a growing recognition by the judicia
ry that if we are going to improve the image
of justice ... one group of major players is
going to have to be judges.”
Another may be a growing movement to
watch the way judges act, and to open lines
for complaints about their conduct, with peo
ple who are neither lawyers nor judges play
ing an increasing role.
While the number of formal complaints has
been growing, there still are relatively few, in
part because lawyers and the people they rep
resent are wary of retaliation from the bench,
Coyle reports in the
ABA Journal. She
is a reporter for the
New Orleans
Times-Picayune,
and was a fellow in
legal journalism at
Yale University.
There was a 40 percent increase in the num
ber of complaints lodged against federal
judges between 1990 and 1993, with a similar
trend in the states. At least 90 percent of the
complaints ultimately are dismissed, as
unfounded or due to the difficulty of differen
tiating between cases in which the losing side
is griping and those in which there really has
been iivjudicious conduct.
With caseloads increasing while staffs are
not, there can be extra pressure on judges.
The stress is heightened by the fact that they
are always on duty, their words recorded, con
duct and even moods closely observed.
The trappings of judgeship can add to the
mix: “A few people think ‘your honor' means
them rather than their office," Payant
observed.
There is a reverse side to all this. “There are
judges who behave impeccably in the court
room and issue dreadful decisions," said Lynn
Hecht Schafran of the NOW Legal Defense
and Education Fund in New York.
In another appraisal of courtroom conduct
and confidence, an academic adviser to the
American Enterprise Institute suggests that
American judges ought to have more authori
ty. James Q. Wilson of the University of
California, Los Angeles, suggests the English
model as an answer, saying judges there have
retained control over their courtrooms while
many U.S. judges have lost it.
English judges select jurors, often question
witnesses, and summarize and evaluate evi- ■
dence, Wilson said. “American judges typical
ly let the lawyers choose the jurors and do all
of the talking."
He said American criminal trials should be
simpler and less adversarial, not lengthy, j
lawyer-dominated soap operas in which the
search for truth has been subordinated to the *
manipulation of procedures."
In contrast to the English system in which
a prosecutor in one case can represent the
defense in the next, high-profile American tri
als have become “mortal combat" between
prosecutors and defense attorneys whose
roles do not change.
“The rewards can be great," Wilson writes,
“Votes, money, prestige and book contracts."
Much of that was on display during and
after the nine-month spectacle of the Simpson
trial. And it has at least raised the level of
discussion and the exchange of ideas on the
long-building problem of confidence in the
courts.
WALTER R. MEARS, vice president and
columnist for The Associated Press, has
reported on Washington and national politics
for more than 30 years.