Title V of the 2nd Lome Convention Between EEC and ACP States: A Critical Assessment of the Industrial Cooperation as it Relates to Africa

On October 31, 1979, representatives from fifty-eight African-Caribbean-Pacific (ACP) and nine European Economic Community (EEC) States signed the second Lome Convetion. This agreement will govern the technical, commercial, and financial relations between the two groups of countries from March 1, 1980 through February 28, 1985. Lome II is the fifth in a series of conventions concluded between the EEC countries and the developing nations of Africa, the Caribbean, and the Pacific. Like its predecessors, Lome II was designed to establish a model for relations between developed and developing states, and lay the foundation for a New International Economic Order. Toward this end, Lome II provided more than 5,607 million European units of account (EUA) - the equivalent of $6,924 million US - in trade and development assistance to the ACP states

Patrimonicide: The International Economic Crime of Indigenous Spoliation

In the past two decades, the organized and systematic theft of a state\u27s wealth and resources by its leaders has reached unprecedented levels in developing and less-developed states. Unlike previous acts of embezzlement by political leaders, this new wave of corruption-referred to as indigenous spoliation--involves billions of dollars and causes widespread social and economic devastation. This Article defines indigenous spoliation and presents some examples of this practice. The author describes the inadequacy of domestic law in dealing with the problem and suggests that international law should provide a remedy. Next, the author proposes a framework for holding persons involved in acts of spoliation individually liable. The author then contends that the international community, through a multilateral treaty, could enforce a prohibition against spoliation by imposing enforcement obligations on individual states. Additionally, the availability of foreign aid and commercial bank credits for developing states could be conditioned on these states proscribing acts of spoliation. The author encourages victim states to change their domestic laws to address spoliation and asserts that indigenous spoliation should be treated as a violation of human rights

Asserting Permanent Sovereignty over Ancestral Lands: The Bakweri Land Litigation against Cameroon

The Article focuses on the recently concluded Bakweri land case against Cameroon in the African Human Rights Commission. The Article uses this litigation as the basis for a re-examination of a host of issues relating to the enforcement of human rights, especially land rights, in postcolonial countries making the slow transition from single-party authoritarian rule to multi-party democratic states. More importantly, it takes a fresh look at the exhaustion of local remedies rule. It asks the relatively simple question: whether an indigenous people seeking to reclaim and assert permanent sovereignty over ancestral lands, forcibly expropriated from them during the period of colonial occupation and subsequently vested in the post-colonial State, should be required to comply with the exhaustion of domestic remedies rule in a country where the rule of law is in its infancy and where the judiciary is neither independent nor impartial. The Article argues that the exhaustion rule should be dispensed with where it is demonstrably clear that local courts are notoriously lacking in independence; there is a consistent and well-established line of precedents adverse to the claimant; and the respondent State does not have an adequate system of judicial protection that complainant can rely on. The Article concludes by advocating for the broadest interpretation possible of the exhaustion rule in order to (a) level the playing field for both parties - the defenseless citizen whose fundamental human rights have been violated and the powerful State responsible for the violation; (b) preserve the right of individual petition now entrenched in all international human rights instruments; and (c) give true meaning to the principle of equality-of- arms upon which all human rights contests are anchored

Only Fools Who Send Hyenas to Roast Meat for Them: In Search of the Doctrinal Foundations of the Not-So-Ordinary Crime of Patrimonicide

Crimes against humanity are generally considered crimes of such unimaginable horror that they shock the conscience of mankind. The Article challenges the international community to take a mental leap by recognizing that the contemporary version of official corruption is so fundamentally different from its historical antecedents that it deserves to (a) be called a different name: indigenous spoliation or patrimonicide; and (b), to be treated as an extraordinary crime that rises up to the level of a crime against humanity. Towards this end, the Article reviews the basic elements of a crime against humanity identified in various legal instruments, and in the law and practice of the three United Nations\u27 ad hoc criminal tribunals. On the basis of this analysis, the Article then proceeds to demonstrate the link between the constituent elements of a crime against humanity and the new crime of indigenous spoliation