Onnoghen and his fair-weather friends Jide Oluwajuyitan

By Jide Oluwajuyitan

Because of their judicial temperament, professional ethics,
courage and integrity, Supreme Court judges ‘lead lives of probity,
free from scandal, drama, rebellion and colour’. They hardly have
friends. Unarguably, CJN Walter Onnoghen fitted very well the
picture of a good judge in our heads. He is never afraid to walk
alone. It will be recalled he along with justices Maryam Aloma
Muktar and Adesola Oguntade once wrote a powerful dissenting
opinions in the controversial case of Muhammadu Buhari vs.
Independent National Electoral Commission. But as Ken Saro-Wiwa
once said, Africa kills its own ‘sun’. Onnoghen is probably the
latest victim of the Nigerian system.

The Nigerian ruling classes populated by senior lawyers are
hardly known for their altruism. It is therefore not too much of a
coincidence to see unanimity among PDP nation-wreckers and those
who aided them in their war against Nigeria either as mandate
snatchers or wreckers of the banking sector. The struggle to
demonstrate who loves Onnoghen best started even before he was
arraigned by before the CCT over non-declaration of assets which
allegedly include some 55 houses and some $3m in five different
bank accounts with 94 lawyers including 40 Senior Advocates of
Nigeria (SAN) led by Chief Oluwole Olanipekun. His admission of
guilt “I forgot to make a declaration of my assets after the
expiration of my 2005 declaration in 2009…Following my appointment
as acting CJN in November, 2016, the need to declare my assets anew
made me to realize the mistake” – seemed to have galvanized support
of additional legal warriors. In the forefront of fair-weather
friends from outside the CJN’s constituency was PDP supported by
Atiku Abubakar, its flagbearer in 2019 election, Uche Secundus, the
party chairman and senate president, Bukola Saraki.

But because PDP thinks Nigerians have short memories, they
probably believe Nigerians have forgotten the state of the
judiciary during their 16 years reign. Under Obasanjo (1999-2007),
PDP had no faith in the judiciary. They settled disputes usually
over sharing of seized assets by eliminating themselves. The party
was described by Wole Soyinka as ‘a nest of killers’. Obasanjo, the
chief security officer of state, was organizing a kangaroo panel of
abducted five or half a dozen state lawmakers locked up in a hotel
room and blackmailed to impeach governors of Bayelsa, Plateau and,
Ekiti states and Oyo states. The judiciary looked the other way.
Corruption stank to the high heavens.

The following was the picture painted by Audu Ogbeh, one time
chairman of PDP: “We are trying to battle with the rule of law; it
is not working too well. There are jokes now that you shouldn’t pay
a lawyer. It is better to pay a judge which the current Chief
Justice (Maryam Aloma Murktar) is fighting because the judiciary
got destroyed by politicians. I have been warning that if we carry
on like this, the politicians will destroy the judiciary
irreparably. The bribes are just too large and in foreign exchange,
too attractive. People pack huge volumes of cash and go around at
night, corrupting judges and making it impossible for them to give
justice”.

The judiciary under Umaru Yar’Adua was reduced to an arm of PDP
with James Ibori using the police to hunt down or drive EFCC
members that probed him and his friend, Bukola Saraki, out of the
police force and the country. Ibori was freed by an Asaba High
Court judge for the same offences that earned him 14 years
imprisonment at a London court. Peter Odili, a Nigerian high court
ruled, must not be probed for his alleged mismanagement of his
state resources. Ex-governor Lucky Igbinedion got a pat on the arm
for looting Edo State.

Under President Jonathan, Ayo Fayose led a gang of thugs to beat
up a judge inside his court room while the judiciary looked the
other way. Justice Isa Salami of the Appeal court was suspended for
retrieving a stolen mandate from Segun Oni of Ekiti and Olagunsoye
Oyinlola of Osun and for averring in a suit in court that Chief
Justice Aloysius Katsina-Alu had asked that the governorship
election petition in Sokoto State be decided in favour of the
candidate of the ruling party.

Jonathan during the swearing-in-ceremony of the Justice Dahiru
Musdapher, as CJN on September 27, 2011, spoke of the “widespread
perception of a growing crisis of integrity in the judiciary”,
while pointing out that “A partisan judge compromises his or her
oath of office and acts unfairly. A corrupt judge disgraces the
Bench on which he or she sits and the title that he or she
wears”.

But that was yesterday. Today PDP says “the attempt to drag the
CJN to the CCT is a grave and dangerous escalation of the assault
on institutions of state including the National Assembly and
judiciary”. Atiku, Obasanjo’s accomplice in his illegal seizure of
Lagos State LGA now says “Nigerians will resist any attempt by the
Buhari presidency to intimidate the judiciary”. The Body of Senior
Advocates of Nigeria, some of whose members are in court over
alleged bribing of judges, is “urging respect for the constitution,
the rule of law, separation of powers, due process and the proper
administration of justice”.

The president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Paul Usoro
who is in court for alleged N1. 5b money laundering sees the
Onnoghen case as a “continuing attack on the justice sector”.

It is obvious that the concern of Onnoghen’s fair-weather
friends is about jurisdiction, a technical method some senior
lawyers often use to delay cases. Citing the Court of Appeal’s
Justice Hyeladzira Nganjiwa case, Chief Mike Ozekhome asserted
that: “The Federal prosecutors are also aware of extant decisions
of the Court of Appeal, to the effect that unless and until the NJC
pronounces a judicial officer guilty, he cannot be arraigned in
court. But Professor Itse Sagay, trying to put the record straight
has told Nigerians that “Those hiding behind jurisdiction are
trying to cover up iniquities of some sort”. The NJC according to
him has only power to determine administrative misconduct of
judicial officers whereas what is before the CCT is a criminal
allegation.

For him, only a grossly ignorant man or an extremely mischievous
one could seriously suggest that the CJN, who is not only the
chairman of the NJC, but also the appointer of 20 out of the NJC’s
23 members adjudicate in his own case. Such will be, a clear
violation, not only of the constitution but also of a long standing
common law principle coming all the way from Magna Carta 1215.

Just as the NJC betrayed the nation during PDP 16 years, “It has
also by its recent actions, according to the Special Adviser to the
President on Prosecutions, Okoi Obono-Obla, “betrayed the nation
when the body recalled Hon. Justice John Inyang Okoro of the
Supreme Court, Hon. Justice Uwani Abba Aji of the Court of Appeal,
Hon. Justice Hydiazira A. Nganjiwa of the Federal High Court, Hon.
Justice A. F. A. Ademola of the Federal High Court, who has been
discharged and acquitted, Hon. Justice Musa H. Kurya of the Federal
High Court, and Hon. Justice Agbadu James Fishim of the National
Industrial Court of Nigeria.” without any consultation with the
anti-corruption agencies and the DSS, that arrested them in the
first place.

Finally, those who probably pay money to Onnoghen’s account
claim the case is all about politics. Tragically, Buhari and
Osinbajo are no politicians or students of Machiavelli. Lawyers who
pay and the judge who’s account was credited would have become
government hostages without unnecessary dissipation of energy in
the courts where bribes in foreign exchange, according to Audu
Ogbeh, makes it impossible for judges to give justice.

Culled from Thenation