Benin opposition leader Reckya Madougou was sentenced on Saturday to 20 years in prison for terrorism by a special court in the capital Porto-Novo after a brief trial that her lawyers condemned as a 'political attack'.
Benin opposition leader Reckya Madougou was sentenced on Saturday to 20 years in prison for terrorism by a special court in the capital Porto-Novo after a brief trial that her lawyers condemned as a "political attack".
"This court has deliberately decided to penalise an innocent person," Madougou said shortly before her prison sentence was announced."It's a sad day for our justice system, I maintain that there is no proof," one of her lawyers, Robert Dossou, told AFP. "Tried at 6am, without witnesses, without documents, without evidence, Recky Madougou was sentenced to 20 years in prison by three accomplices of those in power," her France-based lawyer Antoine Vey tweeted after the sentencing.Vey had told the trial on Friday that "this procedure is nothing but a political attack".He asked for the trial to be cancelled, before leaving the court and never returning -- Madougou's Benin-based lawyers stayed for the remainder.
Benin was long praised for its thriving multi-party democracy in a troubled region. But critics say the West African state's democracy has steadily eroded under Talon, a 63-year-old cotton magnate first elected in 2016.
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