An African Perspective on the Trump Indictment

BBC News

Pres­i­dent Trump Waves to the Crowd

In 2024 the Unit­ed States will vote to elect its 47^th pres­i­dent. The cur­rent pres­i­dent, Joe Biden has said he plans to seek re-elec­tion, while the for­mer pres­i­dent, Don­ald Trump has already declared his inten­tions, even while fac­ing legal bat­tles. 

On March 30th, For­mer Pres­i­dent Don­ald Trump was indict­ed for 34 felony counts for fal­si­fy­ing busi­ness records. The media in Amer­i­ca and around the world have been busy cov­er­ing every detail of the sto­ry. Some of the cov­er­age appears to be sup­port­ing the charges, while oth­ers seem to ques­tion it. 

Accord­ing to Judge Juan Mer­chan who is han­dling the case, the tri­als could start in Jan­u­ary 2024. 

It is impor­tant to note that the indict­ment will not pre­vent Trump from run­ning for office in the 2024 elec­tions. Trump faces oth­er inves­ti­ga­tions on elec­tions inter­fer­ence, the Jan­u­ary 6^th US Capi­tol attack, and his han­dling of clas­si­fied doc­u­ments.

Now if there is evi­dence to back the crimes, then there should be a pros­e­cu­tion. In good faith, these kinds of inves­ti­ga­tions and pros­e­cu­tions should hap­pen to all who are alleged to have com­mit­ted crimes, from pow­er­ful indi­vid­u­als to reg­u­lar people.

 “No one is above the law, not even a for­mer pres­i­dent” Sen­a­tor Eliz­a­beth War­ren stat­ed after the indict­ment was announced.

Coverage by an African Media

The Vanguard’s Azu Ishiek­wene wrote about Trump’s tri­al and high­light­ed the for­mer pres­i­den­t’s woes and records. The records include the first pres­i­dent to be indict­ed and also the first to be impeached twice. The arti­cle notes that Trump faces 34 counts of crim­i­nal con­duct. The writer how­ev­er argues that the tri­al doesn’t make Amer­i­ca spe­cial. Ishiek­wene says tech­ni­cal­ly the first pres­i­dent to be arrest­ed was Ulysses Grant, 151 years ago in 1872.

The arti­cle also high­lights sim­i­lar sce­nar­ios in African coun­tries such as Nige­ria, South Africa, and Sene­gal where for­mer pres­i­dents have faced crim­i­nal charges in court and in front of the world. 

A key take­away from the arti­cle is how Ishiek­wene argues and jux­ta­pos­es Trump’s han­dling of clas­si­fied doc­u­ments with Pres­i­dent Joe Biden, who he said had clas­si­fied doc­u­ments from the time he was vice pres­i­dent under Pres­i­dent Barack Oba­ma. One can argue that the charges come just about a year before the elec­tions, which can be deduced as efforts to stop the oppo­si­tion candidate.

No One Above the Law. Really? 

A look into the case can por­tray two hypothe­ses, one is that in Amer­i­ca no one is above the law. Or, is the indict­ment of Trump a polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed indict­ment? If no one is above the law as Sen­a­tor War­ren claims, why have there been no pros­e­cu­tions of the Jef­fery Epstein list, or guests of the Island?

Fur­ther, it seems every pres­i­dent has had a num­ber of crimes and vio­la­tions, includ­ing for­mer Pres­i­dent Oba­ma, and for­mer first lady Hilary Clin­ton, among oth­ers. If you add to all of this, there was the shock­ing 2020 con­gres­sion­al insid­er trad­ing scan­dal. If the Unit­ed States is intent on clean­ing its house, there should be efforts to address all polit­i­cal issues, includ­ing tax eva­sion by high-fly­ing politi­cians and busi­ness people. 

If the law is to take its course, then by now there should be numer­ous high-pro­file pros­e­cu­tions in Amer­i­ca. Polit­i­cal crimes against pow­er­ful peo­ple in both par­ties should occur or the result will be polit­i­cal tit for tat.

The Trump tri­al is of sig­nif­i­cance to Amer­i­ca, but the ques­tion of the moti­va­tion for charges remains. While there isn’t an ide­al time to press charges, it’s been three years since the cur­rent admin­is­tra­tion took office. Why weren’t these charges pressed earlier?

Addi­tion­al­ly, pre­vi­ous lead­ers like for­mer Pres­i­dent George W. Bush com­mit­ted war crimes, yet faced no crim­i­nal charges. Trump has been indict­ed and could be charged with oth­er crimes. The ques­tion remains if the Trump indict­ment is jus­ti­fied or if this is a polit­i­cal­ly moti­vat­ed jus­tice. If it is tru­ly jus­tice, could we or would we see more high-pro­file arrests in Amer­i­ca in the future?