PRESS RELEASE ON WHY NBA CANNOT ASK JUDGES TO STEP ASIDE BY EBUN
OLU-ADEGBORUWA ESQ
I have read of the suggestion by the President of the Nigerian
Bar Association to the extent that judges who are currently being investigated
for alleged corruption should step aside. The NBA comment is a
"suggestion", because constitutionally, the NBA has no power of
discipline over judges and it is not within the aims and objectives of the NBA
to assume the power of discipline over judges.
In the case of My Lord the Hon Justice Ngwuta, he has deposed to
an oath, barring the details of the disgusting attempts made by members of the
ruling APC to pervert the course of justice, involving two of the party's
serving ministers. Do we ask such a judge to step aside so that the ruling
party will laugh over him, or what?
Now, section 36(5) of the 1999 Constitution states that every
person charged with a criminal offense is presumed innocent until the contrary
is proved. This presumption of innocence, offered to all citizens of Nigeria,
is even in relation to when the citizen has been charged to court, and not
speculations and half truths, based on 'sting' operations.
In the case of the judges, not a single charge has been filed in
court yet, with some proof of evidence, showing some prima facie evidence of
the allegations.
Very recently, the ruling APC bared its wicked fangs against the
legislative arm, by accusing the leadership of the Senate, of forging its own
rules. Eventually, a very frivolous charge was filed in court, with all the
fanfare and media hype. The charge has now been withdrawn, for want of
evidence. One would have imagined the crisis in the Senate had the leadership
bowed to pressure from the APC, for its leadership to step aside, on account of
the manifestly frivolous case. Now it is the turn of judges and all that the
NBA can do is to seek to railroad them into compulsory resignation, even
without trial.
The NBA is already privy to the decision and stand point of the National
Judicial Council, to the extent that the judges will not be suspended based on
mere unproven allegations from the DSS, which has now become the security wing
of the ruling APC. This decision is binding on the NBA, whose accredited
representatives were in attendance at the various sessions of the NJC when its
decision was taken.
I noticed that the NBA executives recently visited Aso Rock
Villa and they were hosted by the Presidency, and so the latest turn around by
the NBA President in capitulating to pressure from politicians and the ruling
APC, to disown the judges, who by tradition, are unofficial members of the Bar,
bears no justification whatsoever.
The Motto of the NBA is to promote the rule of law and due
process, and so, I cannot see how judges who have only been accused of
corruption without any proof or criminal charge, can be asked to abandon their
constitutional duties because they refused to do the bidding of the ruling APC
government and its members.
The NBA is indirectly advocating a system of presumption of
innocence, which is contrary to our Constitution. For instance, there have been
several allegations arising from the recently concluded NBA elections. There
are even cases pending in court. Do we then say that based on these allegations,
the NBA President should step aside? Indeed it was after these allegations and
court cases that the NBA executives were sworn in and inaugurated.
There is no basis for the suggestion by the NBA President for
judges who are being investigated to step aside. It will only open a floodgate
for frivolous allegations and petitions against even innocent judicial
officers, by litigants who may not be pleased with certain decisions of the
judges.
Rather than ask the judges to step aside, the NBA should proceed
to constitute a legal team for judges who are presently under trial and then to
demand for an independent commission of inquiry, into the weighty allegations
of indictment and persecution, made by judges.
We cannot afford a situation whereby politicians who have lost
cases before judges would turn around to instigate the law against those judges
as a way of punishing them or to get rid of them, to pave the way for their
preferred decisions, in political cases. As things are now, judges across the
land dare not give decisions unfavorable to the ruling party, or the powers
that be, contrary to the established norm that everyone is equal before the
law.
The NBA cannot be seen to condone or indeed encourage the
intimidation of judges, or the harassment and ridiculing of the judiciary by
politicians who have lost cases in the open court, after failing to have their
way through attempted corrupt enrichment, of the judges.
The incongruity of NBA's suggestion is made more manifest when
it sees nothing wrong in the Ministers indicted by the judges continuing in
office whereas the judges are to step aside. Already, Hon Justice Adeniyi
Ademola has withdrawn from the Dasuki case, thus helping to achieve the
ultimate design of the APC and the DSS.
The sudden turn around by the NBA does not represent the
aggregate opinion of all reasonable lawyers who are lovers of equity, justice,
rule of law and the independence of the judiciary.
The NBA should be at the forefront of the campaign to ensure
that decisions of our courts are not based on or influenced by nocturnal
manipulations of politicians and litigants. And with the appeals of States like
Abia and Cross River pending for determination in the Supreme Court, one can
guess the kind of pressure that My Lords the justices of the Supreme Court will
be battling with.
Whereas I support and hold the executives of the NBA in very
high regards, there is however no basis for the call for judges being
investigated to step aside, given all the circumstances of the cases.
The NBA should rise up to rescue the judiciary from
manipulators, from monsters and from predators. The APC will not be the first
political party to rule Nigeria, whereby all institutions and persons perceived
to be in opposition must be cowed, destroyed and silenced.
And I'm praying fervently and hoping that the NBA will one day
brace up to ask the President and his executive team to step aside, for failing
to fulfill their campaign promises, for running the economy of Nigeria into
recession, for disobedience to orders of courts, for the brutal massacre of
innocent Shiite and IPOB (Biafra) members, and for several other dictatorial
policies of the government.
Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa, Esq
Life
without Christ is crisis
Sent from my
iPhone
