Reflecting on epic battles with Abacha, Obama and other presidents, advises US law students on human rights advocacy

Washington-based International human rights lawyer Emmanuel Ogebe has warned of the threat to world order posed by a Trump re-election. Delivering a lecture as special guest speaker at Loyola University, Law School ?Business and Human Rights? Class in Maryland, USA Ogebe said, ?I see an existential threat to America in the forthcoming elections, and as human rights lawyers, we tend not to be partisan. We?re equal opportunity critics of every government. So I have fought Democratic Presidents, I?ve fought Republican Presidents, African Presidents, American Presidents. I don?t care.

I know that you haven?t gone through what I went through in Africa. I think I have a keener appreciation of exactly the threat that Trump poses to America and as much as I dislike the Democrats policy on the genocide going on in Nigeria, I am more scared of what will happen to the world if we elect this unhinged, ignorant criminal into office in America, and so I won?t say anymore than that, but I think that my experience gives me a perspective that many Americans may not appreciate.?

Ogebe also counseled the American law students on the risks of becoming a human rights lawyer sharing from his personal experience and practice.

See partial transcript of the Loyola University law lecture below:

Barrister Emmanuel Ogebe: Yeah, yeah. Now, I have to tell you that. And this is the danger of going into the law. If you?re attracted to the law for the wrong reasons, you might find out rather late. So it?s not all glamour. And Glitz. Sometimes the money is good. But sometimes when you go in and you understand what the law is about, your heart takes over, and you really want to be more about justice than about the Benjamins.

And so that?s a risk everyone who goes into law takes. And I joke that a regular lawyer, you know, gets paid to work for clients. But you know human rights lawyers have to pay themselves to work for the clients. You see that situation you?re like, ?yeah, I can?t go to sleep. You know, without doing something about this.?

And so for me, I really was very privileged. You know, I had a good practice, and all of that, and I had very top clients in the regime. And I just said, ?You know, I can?t benefit from this system. It?s an unjust system? and so I was kind of a Robin Hood. I would, you know, bill my rich clients, and I would use my money to fund pro-democracy activities, and ultimately I never forget, one day a journalist reached out to me and said, Hey! They found this woman who had been abducted and was imprisoned, and all of that, and I went to visit her, and what she shared to me was so scary you know, and I was like, ?is this really happening here?? Sometime later an activist was murdered on her way to the Canadian Embassy. And I issued a statement saying, ?Hey, you know, this needs to be investigated,? and that?s it. The goons came, and they abducted me, too and I?m one of the few people who was actually taken to the Presidential Villa Nigeria?s equivalent of the White House, and I was tortured right there. It was a surreal experience, and I think I wasn?t meant to come out of there alive.

They finally found out my dad was a Federal judge, and that really kind of complicated things because I wasn?t just a nobody. I was part of the ruling elite. They didn?t want problems with the judiciary. I couldn?t just disappear but in the torture and interrogation sessions, they kept saying that ?your father is in the government, you?re comfortable. What on earth makes you want to demand democracy?? And they would ask questions like, ?Have you been to America??

There was just this assumption that if you longed for democracy and human rights, you must have been to America. At that point I hadn?t been to America. I?d only been to England so that I thought was fascinating. So I think that that experience helped obviously expose me to the real ills of human rights abuses, and I think that that helped me. When ultimately I came on exile to the US, I felt I had a new lease on life. My life could have ended while I was in prison, and I think it?s made me bolder, more radical in my fight for justice.

The Dictator who imprisoned me, you know, keeled over and died, and elections were held, prisoners were freed, and all of that. So I won that battle, so to speak. And so I have seen that if you take a prophetic stand against evil, ultimately good triumphs over evil, I?ve experienced that. And now I have gone from the chapter where I was up against military dictators in Africa to where I?m up against, you know, democratically elected Presidents in America and I have triumphed again over them, you know, in policy battles, like I did over Obama. And so on and so forth. So I think that prepared me you know, for the world stage, and you know the tons of work that we continue to do, and I tend to say, ?Hey, you know God saved me from a big, bad wolf in Africa. I think He has the capacity to save me in the US as well? and I have to be frank with you. The fights and the dangers I have faced in the US as well are really very shocking.

Can you imagine you know, puny me sitting here in Washington and knowing that the US covered up attacks on American citizens abroad having that information wanting to share, and knowing that there are people here who feel threatened by the information you have who would do anything to silence you and I just have to trust that you know the forces of good will always triumph over evil, as we?ve seen time and time again, and, as I, you know. Maybe wrap up on that thought. You know, I see the upcoming election. I don?t know if I?m allowed to say ? I really don?t care. I?m a human rights lawyer.

Professor Taylor Green: It?s okay. You?re a human rights lawyer. We?re gonna give you the pass.

Barrister Emmanuel Ogebe: There you go, but I see an existential threat to America in the forthcoming elections, and as human rights lawyers, we tend not to be partisan. We?re equal opportunity critics of every government. So I have fought Democratic presidents, I?ve fought Republican presidents, African presidents, American presidents. I don?t care.

I know, but you haven?t gone through what I went through in Africa. I think I have a keener appreciation of exactly the threat that Trump poses to America and as much as I dislike the Democrats policy on the genocide going on in Nigeria, I am more scared of what will happen to the world if we elect this unhinged ignorant criminal into office in America, and so I won?t say anymore than that, but I think that my experience gives me a perspective that many Americans may not appreciate.

Professor Taylor Green: Alright; so I?m gonna ask you one last question, and then I?m gonna turn it over to some of the students to ask you appropriate questions. And then we?ll have Eric probably join in the next couple of minutes. So actually, while I?m asking this last question because I need to filter people, you need to send me your questions directly. If you have any questions because I?m gonna screen them before I tell them to Emmanuel.

Barrister Emmanuel Ogebe: That?s why you are such a smart lawyer. This is why I?ve always appreciated you.

Professor Taylor Green: The last question I just wanted to ask you, Emmanuel, is just kind of like, what?s your advice for someone who wants to pursue human rights work?

Barrister Emmanuel Ogebe: Yeah, so it?s not a walk in the park. You will find that you will overextend yourself. You will find that you take your work home with you at night, you will find that you will pay a price in your family, in your health, in your social life. It?s gonna be very difficult establishing boundaries. But at some point, you know, you do have to, because if we lose you, everyone loses you. You need to be available and well to be able to serve others. So you can imagine with this death row case, you know that we just won. I?m getting calls from all over the world, and all kinds of cases and requests, and I can?t possibly do that. 18 years is a lot to work pro bono on a case. And I have to respectfully say, ?Hey, listen! I will take a look at this case file. If I have any thoughts, you know, I?ll give them to you, but I can?t possibly. You know, work on that case full time. So that?s one of the things you?re gonna have to do is establish those boundaries. But you also need to establish sustainability.

As I mentioned, I had my own, you know, full-fledged practice. We did corporate law. We did litigation, we did all of that, and it was tent-making. It helped us, you know, pay the bills and then support the human rights advocacy which you know was kind of a pro bono initiative. It?s sort of a thing that I continue to do even now.

But there?s just so much human rights work to do that I?ve been turning down regular clients because I find that. You know I never forget. You know there was a firm that wanted me to work with them on the case of an oil executive who had, you know, bribed officials abroad, you know. So it was a foreign Corrupt Practices act case, exactly, I mean. And that?s a ton of money. It?s oil money, it?s easy money and I kid you not. I couldn?t bring myself to do it, I?m like, ?why am I wasting my life on this rich criminal when I could be helping. You know a poor person get off of death row? And so you have to find a balance somewhere. So for me now, I do very, very few income cases, I just you know, put a lot of my life into helping others, but it?s not sustainable if you don?t If you haven?t built up, you know some wealth or some capital or some sustainability, and you know there are a couple of decent decisions I made, you know, when I was practicing, and all of that that has helped me live on a shoestring budget and so on and so forth. So human rights. You gotta, you just you really have to have a calling. I say to people, you know, being in the law is a vocation, you know, kind of like priesthood and medicine. It?s not always about the money. If you?re going about the money you?ll lose your soul you?ll make a ton of money but if you keep your soul, you don?t make that much money, and some people would rather have the soul than the money. Yep.

Professor Taylor Green: I 100% agree. So I do have one question from a student. Thanks for sending that over. So it says, what has been the most rewarding, rewarding aspect of the work you have done?

Barrister Emmanuel Ogebe: Oh, wow! So it?s hard to tell. You know. There?s just so many highlights and so many little things. This week, I was able to get a guy, a kid into nursing school, and I met him a dozen years ago. He was a teenager then. And you know he had just been displaced by terrorists from his community and last year he lost his mom. I heard about it. I tracked him, found out he had all these great grades. He got admitted to college. He went back to his community that he had fled from. His college, was attacked, and he fled again. Now he?s all alone. So I said, ?You know what? Let?s see what we can do.? And I finally was able to get him admission to college. And he?s going to be going to college in a couple of weeks, and that just made my week.

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