Less than 48 hours after I was brutalized by Security guards at Slussen tube station, Aftonbladet, a leading evening Newspaper in Sweden, carried a headline story titled “Guards Film When They Humiliate And Pin Down Their Victims” (Monday 19/0372007). The thrust of the story was that the degrading films (shot with mobile phones) are normally circulated among the guards as “trophies”.
If the situation is transplanted to war-torn Iraq, the films whose picture clips were published in Aftonbladet amounts to “Swedish Abu Grahib” scandal films with holding cells at tube station being the “prisons”.
“People circulate these kind of films between themselves all the time. Very many know about it”, said a 26 year old guard who was interviewed by Aftonbladet Reporter Simon Bynert. The guard said that the films are seen within the guard fraternity as sources of “increasing status”. He estimated with surety that there are about 50 such films doing the round in Stockholm alone!
Interestingly, Sven Erik Alhem, a Senior Prosecutor, told the paper that it can be difficult to pin the guards down in court with the films although he admitted that what they were doing is criminal. According to him, one obstacle could be the legal position that it is the victim of such filming who should follow up the matter.
The brutal and racist handling we were treated to at Slussen tube station by barbaric guards was a continuation of brutality of immigrants (especially Africans) by Swedish guards at tube stations, restaurants and other social places where the guards are found.
A GLIMPSE OF PREVIOUS CASES OF BRUTALITY AGAINST AFRICANS
We were just the latest statistics in the mountain of reports gathering dust in various Swedish archives. In 99% of the cases, the guards always go free and that is if the cases make it to court. Previous attacks on Africans have even been more brutal, sometimes leading to victims being picked up by ambulances, undergoing brain surgery or ending up being paralyzed altogether.
In one of the most outstanding cases that happened in November 2000, Seidou Konte, a Gambian national, was attacked by Swedish security guards at Tre Rammare Restaurant. Seidou had to undergo brain surgery for his life to be saved. A week after his operation, Hospital authorities tried to throw him out into the streets because keeping him in Hospital was “too expensive”.
The hospital’s ground for wanting to cast him out was that Seidou had no residence permit to live in Sweden and that according to the rules, no insurance company would foot his huge bill which was, nevertheless, growing. He was only saved after Discrimination Bureau that was set up by Juan Fonseka, a Latin American, intervened. When the case came up in Court, Seidou lost and the case was closed.
The attack on Seidou came barely 10 months after Adonis Hocheimy, a Gambian national and father of a young girl, was brutally attacked by guards at Västra Skågen tube station. Unlike Seidou who escaped with a brain surgery, Adonis ended up being totally paralysed from the waist downwards. He landed on a wheel chair.
According to the guards, Adonis tried to get into the tube station without a ticket. The case of Winnie Mukaru, who was arbitrarily locked in by the guards, was different from that of Adonis because while she had a ticket, she was manhandled because the ticket attendant refused to stamp it, a position which the guards were defending at the time they cast Winnie into the cell. They were two huge guards and after they seized Winnie, they threw her in the cell like a mango being thrown into a hollow basket. They did it in a split of a second and even my digital camera could not catch the real action. We cannot give all examples here. However, the case of Mr. Abert Taabu, a Kenyan musician resident in Stockholm, is worth mentioning.
In April 2002, Taabu became unconscious after he was attacked by guards at Tre Rammare, the same restaurant where seidou was also attacked. When Mark Gaya, a Kenyan who was then the Chairperson of Kenya United Welfare Association (KUWA) tried to intervene, Mr. Gaya was himself swept off his feet by a group of guards before he could even reach the scene where Taabu was being brutalized. Just like myself on Saturday, Mark Gaya lost his mobile during the process but he did manage to pull out Taabu’s mobile from where the Kenyan was lying unconscious on the ground. It was Mark Gaya who called the ambulance and the police. The case did not even make it to court despite the presence of witnesses.
POLICE/STATE CONSPIRACY IN THE ABORTION OF JUSTICE
The fundamental point is that the guards brutalize people because they are implicitly protected by the Swedish Legal system which has notoriously failed to deliver justice to victims of attack. The main tactic used within the system is to prevent any case of brutality from reaching the courts and this is done through the office of the Prosecutor.
The conspiracy begins from the police who take statements at the scene of crime. When we were brutalized, the police refused to file a case arguing that I had “injured myself” when I fell down. But when the policeman was confronted by witnesses, he quickly backed down and took my story.
The next point of conspiracy comes when the police records the statement at the police station. Loop-holes are normally created to try and weaken the case. For example, Seidou’s case could not go forward because police refused to stage a live parade so that Seidou could identify the guards who attacked him. Instead, they wanted him to identify the guards through old pictures. The police were calculating that he would identify the wrong guard and create a ground for the case to be dismissed in case it went to court.
At that time, Seidou had no legal status and this complicated the situation because he could not get a lawyer to help him through the process. Due to lack of legal representation, the Gambian had difficulties in dealing with legal issues that continued to pop up during his struggle for justice. While I was visiting him in hospital, police came and asked him when he intends to return to Gambia! It appears as though police thought that by intimidating him using his return to Gambia as ammunition, the brutalized Seidou would develop cold feet and dump the case. He didn’t.
THE TACTIC OF “BLACK AGAINST BLACK” TO PROMOTE RACISM
Politically, the case of Swedish security guards walking away with wanton brutality against immigrants especially Africans is because of institutionalized State racism and discrimination of immigrants that also exists in other public sectors. The housing and the labour markets are areas where State racism is probably at its apex.
In Sweden, Immigrant groups have been congregated at “Immigrant areas” while professionals of Immigrant backgrounds are routinely denied jobs using petty reasons even if they are qualified. Currently, Rinkeby in Stockholm is the biggest slum area in Sweden, having been created through a scotched earth policy of denying Immigrants opportunities to settle in “Swedish areas” even if such Immigrants are economically stable. The consequence is that “gangs” comprising of first or second generation of immigrant youths have emerged in Sweden, a country that was once projected as the most advanced Welfare State on earth.
We were attacked by the guards but it should not be a shock if the case is thrown out and that is IF it reaches the courts. The most important aspect of the attack is that it was not another hidden statistic. We brought it out and this is what Africans and other Immigrant groups who are targets of attacks should be doing. I wish to send a vote of thanks to two Kenyans, both Mr. Makan Macharia and Mr. Daniel Mwaura for having rushed to the scene after they gathered that we were under attack.
Another angle which could be examined is the role of Africans being used by the system to promote racism and discrimination in this country. In the Saturday attack, an African woman purportedly from Uganda and whom, we were told, is notorious when it comes to giving Africans difficulties at tube stations was in charge.
In the case of Winnie, it was a classic case of setting “Sister against sister”. When the guards then come in to attack, the system has put into place a process where charges of racism and discrimination can simply be thrown out of the window. It is not surprising that After the African ticket attendant refused to stamp Winnie’s ticket, she quickly called the guards so that she could stand aside and enjoy the drama as her “opponent” is humiliated and harassed before being thrown into the holding cell with indignity! The tactic has been working well – thanks to the House niggers!
At Restaurants where Africans are not allowed entry, it is not strange to find an African guard stationed at the door with one or two white guards. When it reaches the point where the African has to be told that he is not welcome, it is the Nigger who normally does the job.
In case an argument erupts between the black guest and the Black guard, it’s easy. The white guards will zero in to throw the black guest out as the black guard watches events quietly, as if nothing has happened. Brutality by Security guards against Immigrants is an “everyday recipe” in Sweden . For readers outside there, that is the Sweden we live in.
Okoth Osewe
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hi thats really sad to what happened to the victims of brutality,how can i get in touch with adonis hocheimy.please foward my email to him thank you