Unsafe Democracy And Tricky Electoral Justice System
EVEN as experts on strategic distraction in the polity appear to be succeeding in imposing some frivolous agenda including a third-term-for-buhari ambush on the media space, I would like to draw our attention to what I have considered a weightier matter of the law and governance in these perilous times. I want us to reflect on whether we can rely on the present state of the judiciary to secure this our rickety democracy.
Political scientists may have their say about the most important arm of government in a democracy. Professors including Ben Nwabueze may have posited powerfully about the strategic importance of the legislature. Influential researchers and legal luminaries such as Tunji Abayomi, PHD who have dug very deep on the inestimable power of the executive may have told us about the potency of the powers in the hand of a man the organic law of the land introduces to the citizens as the chief executive of the federation.
Even the pen-power men may be boasting about their powers as the ‘monitoring spirit’ of the constitution as the Fourth Estate of the Realm, which has the powers to hold the other three arms to account.
But I want us to consider the implications of impurities in the arm of government, which has a responsibility to ensure that these powerful men in the other arms of government can’t rule anyhow. I mean the arm that can ensure that it is only the law that rules is not to be trifled with. It is not about supremacy of any arm of government. I would like us to have some introspection on the consequences of what D. Olu Olagoke, a professor of English, mused years ago in his remarkable drama sketch, ‘ (1962), which warns that, ‘
The courts have since 2007 been declaring governorship candidates who were never voted for as duly elected. Because of the unethical and corrupt conduct of primaries, states such as Zamfara and Rivers lost electoral sovereignty when governorship, senatorial and house of representative elections were declared null and void by the apex court and a particular political party lost all.
Now in Nigeria, governors are afraid of forming their cabinet until the Supreme Courts have declared them duly elected. National Assembly and State Assembly members can’t sleep well until the Courts of Appeal have declared them elected. Electoral sovereignty now belongs in the court and not the people. It is thus curious that politicians now do whatever is politically possible to be declared elected by the electoral officers and they take the battle to courts where ‘electoral justice’ is finally served. At ‘The Nigerian Women Strategy Conference’ with the theme: “Building Bridges of Opportunity: 2015 Elections and Beyond” on February 17, 2014 in Abuja, Chief Olanipekun, concluded in his paper titled, ‘ to the participants at the conference organised by the then Speaker of the House of Representatives, Hon. Mulikat Akande Adeola:
“…
Awolowo himself named ‘the Law’, Chief FRA Williams, would come to see the Editor of
with his own signed ‘Letter to the Editor’ whenever he found any stories in any newspapers, which put the judiciary in any bad light. The old man with a lot of medals on law practice and an authentic Senior Advocate of Nigeria would always tell the Editor before submitting the letters, “My son, you shouldn’t write anyhow stories that can ruin the reputation of the judiciary like that…that is the last hope of the common man…if that last hope is ruined, all is lost…”
Then the giant died. Thereafter, the last man standing for the majesty of the law, Chief Gani Fawehinmi joined him. Now, what will Chiefs William, Fawehinmi and Justice Eso be discussing about the Temple of Justice in the presence of the God of Justice in heaven?
As a citizen of this great country, I am worried because if the executive arm is rotten, it can be replaced and fixed; if the legislature is compromised and weak, it can be democratically replaced too; if the media becomes a weapon of mass distortion facts for the other arms, it can also be replaced by even foreign media, but as Professor Olagoke had warned, ‘if the citadel of justice is corrupt, what will happen to the body politic that is bound to be rotten and collapse?
Elders of the land should be concerned about the last hope that the common man is fast losing. The political class that is benefiting from the (incipient) rot in the ‘temple of justice’ should be worried about the consequences of the anger of the common man who is about to lose the last hope iconic Williams advertised to him – the judiciary.
There should be serious introspection on this now. While reflecting on the electoral justice system and the last hope the common man is losing, read the lamentation of Femi Falana on the state of the judicial system even in Abuja where citizen Sowore would have been curiously convicted without organic trial but for vigilance of the counsel. Read the account here as told here the other day in a piece titled, ‘ https://guardian.ng/opinion/beholdthe-monster-has-returned/
R