Recall of suspended judges
The National Judicial Council (NJC) recently recalled six of the country’s serving judges who were suspended from sitting in the wake of raids on their homes by the Department of State Services, DSS. In what the security agency called a sting operation, the judges who serve at various courts including the Supreme Court had their homes raided and searched at very odd hours, with DSS claiming to have recovered huge sums of money in various currencies from them.
The affected judges were subsequently designated for arraignment in court while the entire saga attracted mixed reactions from the public with opinions divided on the propriety of the action by the DSS, especially with respect to how the raids were conducted. Meanwhile the affected judges were subsequently suspended from sitting in court by NJC. However following the seeming inability of DSS to charge most of them to court within the statutory time frame, NJC recalled the affected judges. The recalled judges are Justice John Inyang Okoro of the Supreme Court, Justice Uwani Abba Aji of the Court of Appeal, Justice Hydiazira Nganjiwa of the Federal High Court Yenagoa; Justice Adeniyi Ademola of the Federal High Court, Abuja; Justice Musa Kurya of the Federal High Court and Justice James Agbadu-Fishim of the National Industrial Court, NIC. According to NJC the continued suspension of the judges without trial was in effect an unmasked denial of justice for them.
However the action of the NJC attracted sharp condemnation from the Presidency. Special Adviser to the President Okoi Obono Obla chided the judicial body and accused it of working against the Presidency’s anti-corruption efforts. Also throwing his weight behind the Presidency was professor of law and Chairman of the Presidential Committee on Anti Corruption Itse Sagay, who condemned the judges’ recall. Meanwhile the nation’s legal community has been aroused by the development with opinions swerving in support of NJC. According to a lawyer Mallam Yusuf Ali (SAN), “You can’t keep the sword of Damocles on people’s head forever”.
We cannot agree more with NJC over the course of the events especially since it acted within the provisions of the law. In the context of the same provisions it is significant that the DSS failed to discharge its functions with respect to facilitating due arraignment of the judges as provided by law, and thereby created the present situation. The least that was expected from DSS was a proper follow through with the arraignment, against the backdrop of the impression they gave the public that their mission was fail safe. Nigerians now know better, and are questioning the profiling of these judges by DSS as the poster boys of deep seated corruption in the nation’s judiciary.
An immediate fallout of the spectacle is the insinuation that the Presidency may have been out to rubbish the judiciary for whatever reason. That is why the Presidency needs to come clean on the matter of the recalled judges by ensuring propriety in all aspects of managing their cases. In this regard the failure of DSS to conduct proper investigations before and after raiding the homes of the judges should bother the Presidency more than casting aspersions on NJC.
Beyond the foregoing is also the fact that the plight of the judges serves as a metaphor in capturing the circumstances of the ordinary Nigerian with respect to the administration of justice in the country. If judges with their relatively privileged status can be subjected to the misfortune of avoidable delay of justice, it becomes easy to appreciate the daily misfortunes of the ordinary citizen on the street who may not have the necessary connections to escape judicial abuse. It is not too late for DSS, EFCC or other security agencies to arraign any of the judges if there is sufficient evidence to warrant such. The most important lesson however is that spectacular raids at midnight are diversionary if the harder task of assembling evidence that will stand up in court is not done.