FG disputes his claims
The drama surrounding the disappearance, arrest and deportation from Nigeria of Mr. Charles Taylor, has taken yet another dramatic twist as the spiritual adviser to the former Liberian president claimed that Taylor was actually encouraged to flee from his asylum home by Nigerian security agents who later double-crossed him.
The Federal Government, has, however, disputed the claims, saying that Taylor was not in anyway betrayed by either President Olusegun Obasanjo or the Nigerian authorities, and that what Taylor's spiritual adviser said were figments of his imagination.
Taylor, who is facing trial for crimes against humanity, was said to have informed his Indian evangelist, Kilari Anand Paul, on phone from his jail room that Nigerian security forces had encouraged him to run away from his home-in-exile and had driven him to the border post where he was subsequently arrested.
Taylor said "they escorted him to the North, way off toward Cameroon and, in the middle of nowhere, told him to go. He said, 'Where are you guys going?' And they said they received instructions to leave him and they left," according to Paul, who spoke from his home in Houston, Texas.
Paul said Taylor told him in during the phone call from jail at the weekend that it was State Security Service agents, and not the normal police guards, who had come with two vehicles to his Calabar villa the night of March 28. Taylor and five or six people in his entourage were ordered into the lead vehicle, and the security agents followed in the second, Paul quoted Taylor as saying.
Taylor had travelled more than 966km along roads that have numerous checkpoints manned by police, army and customs officials, before reaching the border with Cameroon hours later.
Before he crossed over, according to Paul: "The same agents turned up and arrested him... they had guns and told him to surrender himself."
Paul said Taylor told him he believed his captors thought he would flee, and that the agents had been ordered to kill him, "but they couldn't because he surrendered without any resistance, and because he had five or six people with him."
Last Sunday, Paul included a reporter in a telephone conference call with Taylor, who spoke from the heavily guarded detention centre of the tribunal in Freetown, Sierra Leone.
The reporter heard Taylor ask Paul to "bring two attorneys. Bring them any way you can. I need somebody to take charge of this defense immediately... (I need) to put things into motion because we have only 30 days to answer the indictment."
Taylor has been indicted by the United Nations-backed tribunal in Sierra Leone on 11 counts pertaining to Sierra Leone's 11-year civil war, which he is accused of fomenting to plunder its rich diamond fields
Many were suspicious when the Federal Government declared Taylor missing a week ago, just days after Obasanjo reluctantly agreed to hand him over from the asylum he had been offered under an internationally brokered peace agreement ending Liberia's 14-year civil war.
He was arrested on Wednesday and taken to the war crimes tribunal in Sierra Leone, where he was officially charged yesterday afternoon.
Some questioned the timing of Taylor's capture - a day after Obasanjo had left for a trip to the US, where the White House suggested he would not be meeting with US President George Bush unless he could answer questions about Taylor's disappearance.
But in a swift reaction yesterday, the Federal Government said at no time did it strike a deal with Taylor so there was no truth in allegations linked to the former Liberian leader of any betrayal.
Special Assistant on Public Affairs to President Obasanjo, Chief Femi Fani-Kayode, said apart from being far-fetched, it is “a clear figment of an imagination that has gone completely wild”.
Fani-Kayode who accused Taylor’s spiritual adviser, of having “been watching too many James Bond movies”, stressed that neither Obasanjo nor the Federal Government and the people of Nigeria were in the habit of betraying anybody and certainly not Taylor.”
He added, “Throughout this whole episode, the President of Nigeria and the Federal Government have behaved in a responsible, responsive and decent manner. We honoured all our obligations and we did the right thing at the right time. We did not betray anybody, neither do the Nigerian people nor the federal government or their president betray people”.
According to Fani-Kayode, “the President is not in the habit of responding to so-called spiritual advisers that we know nothing about or have ever met. This is obviously a questionable man. “We do not know what his relationship with Taylor is and it is not our business. Whether they spoke on phone or were together in Sierra Leone, it is not our business.”
Meanwhile, Taylor yesterday pleaded not guilty before an international war crimes tribunal, denying 11 counts of helping destabilise West Africa through killings, sexual slavery and sending children into combat. Taylor at first told the court he could not enter a plea because he did not recognise its right to try him. But after Justice Richard Lussick insisted, Taylor said calmly and slowly: "Most definitely, your honor, I did not and could not have committed those acts against the sister republic of Sierra Leone."
Lussick accepted that as a not guilty plea and instructed aides to set a start date for the trial. He, however, did not say where the next hearing might be held.
As the hour-long hearing ended, Taylor stood, smiled and blew kisses to relatives who were in the courtroom.
Although Taylor made his first court appearance in Sierra Leone, Special Court officials have requested that an international court in the Netherlands, host the trial. Liberian President Ellen Johnson-Sirleaf has expressed fear that Taylor supporters could use the trial as an excuse to mount another insurgency in her country.
Taylor said through his lawyer that he feared for his safety in Sierra Leone but wanted to be tried in the region, in part because it would be easier for defense witnesses to appear here. The court's chief prosecutor has said Taylor has no reason to fear for his safety.
Desmond de Silva, chief prosecutor of the independent, U.N.-backed war crimes court trying Taylor, has dismissed such concerns.
Taylor is the first former African president to face war crimes charges. He was brought to Sierra Leone last week after briefly escaping custody in Nigeria, where he was staying since 2003 under a deal to end Liberia's civil war.
Security was tight at the court, with bulletproof glass and dozens of U.N. peacekeepers from Mongolia and Ireland protecting Taylor and officials who received death threats.
Taylor showed little emotion as a court official, Krystal Thompson of the United States, read the indictment. He sat at a table, wearing headphones and flanked by two security officers. When the official read "murder, a crime against humanity," he laced his fingers on the table before him.
More than 100 people, including Taylor relatives and Liberia's ambassador, were in the courtroom. Most reporters watched on closed circuit TV from elsewhere in the complex.
Taylor was represented by a court-appointed lawyer, Vincent Nmehielle of Nigeria, because his own lawyers had not completed procedures necessary to appear before the court.
Taylor met with his lawyers for the first time Monday morning shortly before his court appearance. Two lawyers from Liberia and two from Ghana "gave him our advice and he will consider it. We consider our mission accomplished," said Kofi Akainyah, a Ghanaian member of the team.
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