{{Short description|Twenty year old woman who was killed in Belgium}}
{{Infobox Biography | name = Semira Adamu | image = Semira Adamu.jpg | birth_date = 15 April 1978 | birth_place = Kaduna,{{citation needed|date=January 2022}} Nigeria | death_date = 22 September 1998 (aged 20) | death_place = Brussels, Belgium | death_cause = Suffocation }}
'''Semira Precious Adamu'''<ref>{{Cite web |title=Semira Adamu, Never Again |url=https://www.rektoverso.be/artikel/semira-adamu-never-again |access-date=2023-12-10 |website=www.rektoverso.be}}</ref> (15 April 1978 – 22 September 1998) was a 20-year-old Nigerian asylum seeker who was suffocated to death by two Belgian police officers on a aeroplane in Brussels, Belgium, during her forced deportation on September 22, 1998.<ref name=":0">{{Cite web|title=Belgium: Semira Adamu's case an opportunity to further review expulsion procedures|url=https://www.amnesty.org.uk/press-releases/belgium-semira-adamus-case-opportunity-further-review-expulsion-procedures|website=www.amnesty.org.uk}}</ref> The police officers recorded video footage of themselves exchanging jokes as they pushed her head deep into a pillow for 20 minutes<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=Statewatch News online: Five police officers on trial over the death of Semira Adamu in 1998|url=http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/dec/09semira-adamu.htm|website=www.statewatch.org}}</ref><ref>{{Cite news|last=Bates|first=Stephen|date=13 May 1999|title=The hidden holocaust|work=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/theguardian/1999/may/13/features11.g22|access-date=13 January 2022}}</ref> with her hands and ankles handcuffed;<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|last=Fair Trials admin|date=18 December 2019|title=Belgium: Semira|url=https://www.fairtrials.org/case-study/belgium-semira}}</ref> during which Adamu had stopped breathing for 7 to 8 minutes.<ref name=":1">{{Cite news|last=Osborn|first=Andrew|date=13 December 2003|title=Belgian police guilty of deportation death|work=The Guardian|url=https://www.theguardian.com/world/2003/dec/13/andrewosborn|access-date=13 January 2022}}</ref> She died in the St Luc Hospital later the same day at 9:32pm.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=Statewatch News online: Five police officers on trial over the death of Semira Adamu in 1998|url=http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/dec/09semira-adamu.htm|website=www.statewatch.org}}</ref> When the court asked why so much force was used, one of the officers said that it was necessary "to avoid disturbing other passengers".<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":1" />
Of the 9 police officers who surrounded Adamu on the plane set off for Togo during the sixth attempt to deport her, 4 were given suspended sentences for involuntary murder in December 2003.<ref name=":0" /><ref name=":1" /> The chief police officer received a 14-month sentence, and 3 other officers were given 1-year sentences. A fifth police officer was acquitted. Undisclosed damages were paid by the Belgian state to Adamu's family as ordered by the court.<ref name=":4" /><ref name=":2">[https://www.irr.org.uk/cgi-bin/news/open.pl?id=5907 Four police officers convicted] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20110927234402/https://www.irr.org.uk/cgi-bin/news/open.pl?id=5907|date=2011-09-27}}</ref>
== Background == Adamu had fled Nigeria in March 1998 because she was forced to marry a 65-year-old man she did not know. He had already married four other women and allegedly killed one of them.<ref name=":3" /> Adamu's intended destination was Berlin, but as the plane stopped over at Zaventem, she was taken to the 127bis Detention Centre in Steenokkerzeel as a result of their safe third country rule on March 26, 1998. She was questioned there for the first time and was denied entry; after an appeal against this decision, a second interview decided to forcibly deport her.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=Statewatch News online: Five police officers on trial over the death of Semira Adamu in 1998|url=http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/dec/09semira-adamu.htm|website=www.statewatch.org}}</ref>
The Belgian authorities made 5 attempts to deport Adamu. Her lawyer stated that she was warned that any violence inflicted upon her "would be her own fault", and that she had feared for her own life. Adamu had become a cause célèbre and her situation led to demonstrations around Steenokkerzeel.<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=Statewatch News online: Five police officers on trial over the death of Semira Adamu in 1998|url=http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/dec/09semira-adamu.htm|website=www.statewatch.org}}</ref> On 20th September, she appeared in a television documentary on rejected refugees. In it, Adamu gave a detailed description of the 4th attempt to deport her:<blockquote>''"I was woken at 6:30 a.m. and given 20 minutes to prepare for departure... When we arrived at the airport my hands and feet were bound and I was thrown into an isolation cell for over three hours. At 11:15 they forced me onto the plane. I began to scream and cry as I was surrounded by six gendarmes and two men from Sabena. The airline men pushed me around and one held a cushion to my face. He almost suffocated me. These men were supposed to accompany me all the way to Lome. Passengers intervened at this point, saying that they would get off the plane if the men did not let me go."''<ref name=":4">{{Cite web|title=Statewatch News online: Five police officers on trial over the death of Semira Adamu in 1998|url=http://www.statewatch.org/news/2003/dec/09semira-adamu.htm|website=www.statewatch.org}}</ref></blockquote>
== Reactions == {{More citations needed section|date=March 2022}} The announcement of Adamu's death led to grassroots protests in Belgium. A few hundred people surrounded the detention camp. Inmates went on hunger strikes.
This caused the Belgian deputy prime minister and home office minister Louis Tobback to resign.
==References== {{reflist}}
==External links== {{sisterlinks|d=Q1962410|c=Category:Asylum seekers|n=no|b=no|v=no|voy=no|m=no|mw=no|s=no|wikt=no|species=no}} * [http://indymedia.be/en/node/4172 A Photo Report: Commemorating Semira Adamu] * ''({{ISO 639 name|nl}})'' [http://www.dekamer.be/kvvcr/showpage.cfm?section=qrva&language=nl&cfm=qrvaXml.cfm?legislat=49&dossierID=49-B159-05-0888-1997199824499.xml Interpellation in the Belgian parliament about forced marriage as a reason for granting asylum in light of this case]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Adamu, Semira}} Category:Nigerian refugees Category:1978 births Category:1998 deaths Category:Deaths from asphyxiation Category:Deaths in police custody in Belgium Category:Trials in Belgium Category:People from Kaduna