Gangsterism in the temple of justice

BY SUNDAY ANIYI

Friday 12, 2019 heralded what seemed like an apocalypse, when the story of the imminent arraignment of the Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Walter Onnoghen, GCON, broke towards the dusk of that date. Initially, disbelief loitered with dismay as it was received as one of those inscrutable but endless mischiefs that have become the hobby of some hedonistic news pranksters. By Friday, the social media territory had been gripped with the possible inevitability of what was previously assumed to be a senseless rumors.

Finally, snippets of the accusations began to saunter to the public square to the awe of a bewildered nation. Chiefly, the Chief priest in the temple of Justice was alleged to have committed beyond felonious infractions that qualified him to stand in the dock as a presumed innocent of a raft of crimes. He was said, to have, in a suspicious manner, under-disclosed his assets in dissonance to the demands of the constitution. He was also not timeous in the disclosure of the under-disclosed. This again, prosecutors argued, was a grievous offence. More disturbing is the fact that the CJN was accused of keeping humongous hard currency accounts in jealously guarded domiciliary vaults. This again, the law barks vigorously at, as an unpardonable crime. In very tendentious manner, the petitioner who blew the lid and the unusually efficient Code of Conduct Bureau (CCB), quickly clobbered what seems like a mesh of inescapable charges against the CJN. And in fairness to him, he was to have his day before the Code of Conduct Tribunal on Monday, January 14, 2019.

One would think the gentle process of law would have been allowed to take its normally sluggish cause. But it is rather naïve, as it played out to be, to hold as an opinion because this is Nigeria, a land of impossible possibilities. By Sunday evening of January 13, it was clear that the privileged dukes and duchesses of the Bar and their invisible but perceivable Bench allies, had, like bullish gangsters, vowed themselves to a commitment to frustrate any move to “humiliate” His infallible Lordship. They would resist, including illegally, any effort to dock the CJN which they believed was unprecedented and they would do anything to protect the person of Justice Onnoghen including desecrating the temple of justice. They were not concerned about inviolable justice, probity, purity, integrity and honesty, they were concerned about class solidarity and supremacy.  They would rather defend the cassock and not mind if the cross is broken.

A motley of acquiescing senior lawyers were unleashed on the media landscape and they mostly promoted the same specious and implausible line of sophistry that has now called to question the integrity of the silk. A particular one, who was addressed as a Professor of Law on Channels TV even aberrantly and odiously insisted that the CJN should IGNORE court summons because, in his majestic arrogance, a particular procedure fanciful to his gangsters has not been followed! He believed the CJN was under no obligation to obey a court summon until his own variant of a preferred procedure has been enthroned. When the obviously biased anchor who had been asking leading questions hitherto asked him to answer a clear yes or no question as to whether he was saying the CJN should ignore court summon, the rattled professor went on a wild legalistic grandiloquence without a convincing affirmation because his conscience could not reconcile with his corrosive sophistry.

One was wondering if issues of jurisdiction are not a source of preliminary objections which the platoon of lawyers to the venerable CJN could raise! If they were really sure CCT lacked the locus to hear the matter, it was simply politic to quickly raise that before hearing proceed. Strangely, they concentrated on the issue of service to buy time while simultaneously filing another case in an Industrial Court to challenge the competence of the CCT which the Supreme Court already said had the same status with a high court just as the industrial court. All of this to muddle the water, confuse the process and vitiate the entire case. But they are supposed to be moral prefects of the noble profession! An issue involving the highest judicial priest in the land should not have to adopt desperate tactics known with desperadoes. If his ways are without blemish. The fact that everything is being done to forestall substantial evaluation of the issue is a pointer to the precarious albatross that has brought about prevarication as a survival oxygen. This is unfortunate and really troubling.

Basically, there are primary things in the hailstones of confusion that has been orchestrated in this matter. The resolution of this things will easily resolve the endless dramatization and grandstanding being witnessed in the matter. The first is to determine if Code of Conduct Tribunal (CCT) as defined in the constitution is answerable to National Judicial Council? The answer is no, because its members are not appointed through NJC. This is because it’s a single purpose Tribunal with an ombudsman function over all public servants. The next question will be: does CCT try professional misconducts? The answer is no! It tries cases referred to it from CCB that has to do with violation of the Codes of conducts for public officers. The implication is that CCT can’t try judges for professional misconducts. But it can try them for criminal offences relating to Codes of Conducts for all public officers.

Then, the question next is was CJN Onnoghen taken to CCT as a judicial officer or as public officer? The answer is that CJN Onnoghen was to be arraigned as a public officer not as a judicial officer. Another question is to know whether it is in all cases that a judicial officer must be referred to the National Judicial commission (NJC). The answer is capital NO! A judicial officer is to be referred to the NJC based on allegation relating to his conducts as a judge.  What did the now popular case of NGANJIWA vs FGN say about this? The Appealed Court averred that no judge can be taken to court on account of judicial misconduct.

The Appeal Court went on to define misconducts from both the linguistic meaning of it and the professional code of conduct for judges. Appeal Court argued that a judge can’t be sued to courts on allegation of bias by a party, delay of cases, wrong determination of cases, inappropriate affiliation with a party, direct communication with a party, bribery to tilt judgment, drunkenness, street fight, scandalous bankruptcy, indiscretion, miscarriage of justice, ridiculous granting order, taking cases without jurisdiction, not communicating decision to both party, absenteeism, refusal to take lawful instruction from his supervisory authority like the chief judge, granting press interview on cases before him among other misconduct that judges are not expected to do.

Is misconduct the same as crime? No! Misconduct can only earn you a warning, demotion, suspension, stagnation, interdiction, dismissal and any other recommendations. A crime however, attracts penalties like fine, imprisonment, death, state confiscation of property, denial of rights, disqualification from political participation etc.  The NGWANJIYA’s case being speciously and partially quoted to blackmail the CCT, clearly distinguishes between judicial misconduct and a crime. The Court of Appeal said like other Nigerians, judicial officers are not immune to direct prosecution if the allegation is criminal in nature and not committed in the cause of exercising a judicial mandate. The Court of appeal said inter alia ”…IT MUST BE EXPRESSLY STATED THAT IF A JUDICIAL OFFICER COMMITS THEFT, FRAUD, MURDER OR MANSLAUGHTER, ARSON AND THE LIKES, (emphasis mine) which are committed outside the scope of the performance of his official functions, he may be arrested, interrogated and prosecuted accordingly by the state DIRECTLY WITHOUT RECOURSE TO THE NJC. These classes of criminal acts are not envisaged and captured by the provisions of the paragraph 21, part 1 of the Third schedule. On the other hand, if any judicial officer commits misconducts within the scope of his duty and is investigated, arrested and subsequently by security agents without a formal complaint or reports to the NJC, it will be a usurpation of the latter’s constitutionally power under Section 158 and paragraph 21 part 1 of the Third Schedule…”

Thus, why are the so-called learning senior lawyers deliberately obfuscating the argument and are aggressively promoting the narrative that a judicial officer can’t be brought before court without the approval of NJC? The reason is not far-fetched, they wanted to promote the lie to the point of being the law so as to present the matter as that the CJN was being unduly victimized illegally. Indeed, a senior lawyer said suing the CJN in court is an illegality. I held my head and screamed aloud at how taking somebody to court, even for the most frivolous and ridiculous reason, can be called illegality. In fact when a supposed NBA VP was asked if the issue before CCT is a misconduct or a crime, he said “to me (sic), it is a misconduct”. Again, I shook my head in disbelief.

Declaration of Assets is done through Form C 001, I filled one as a former teacher in a public tertiary institution. You are to take the form to a high court and swear to an affidavit (an oath) before a judge to the effect that everything contained in it is the truth. The document is then stamped before you submitted it personally at the CCB office. I am not a lawyer but my basic law class told me that lying on oath is perjury. I am also aware that the crime of perjury can earn a convict nothing less than six months imprisonment. Therefore, why will a notable lawyer say perjury is a misconduct? It is because he is working to the dictate of the gangsters who already imposed a position which must not be contradicted. He did not want to go contrary to what the judicial dons had decreed as the new law. They actually believed we are barren and blind nation where people have no eyes to see nor a brain to think with.

And to prove their class’ resolve to actualize inequality before the law, all the legal superstars ganged up against the effort to fight corruption by trading sentiments like little children. In their tens, they invaded the court to intimidate fragile judge and his team. They cleverly diverted the attention of the court from the severity of the felony at hand by grandstanding on a non-extent law. They waylaid the judicial process through frivolous claim. They even overruled the CJN’s right to receive summon through his own personal assistant whom he directed to get same on his behalf. Even though the CJN already received the court summon, the gangsters said he must be given another one personally. This is so shameful to do in a case involving the judicial papacy of Nigeria who had frowned on deliberate delay and frustration of judicial process in the past. With About 100 lawyers standing for one accused who is now being glorified and lionized by the so called priests in the temple of justice, while the state that wants corruption free society is now demonized and blackmailed as the villain, you have no one to tell you how the case will end. The case is now narrated as executive vs judiciary, north vs south, Christian vs Muslim, majority vs minority, APC vs PDP and they vs we; it is now a matter of which sides do you stand with.

One thing is however sure, no matter how the gangsters use bully tactics to smuggle the suspect out the embarrassing moment, the truth remains the CJN has lost the charisma, grace and mystique of the office. He is like any suspect trying all manner of judicial tricks to stay afloat, while going about as a judicial fugitive who is running away from trial. He will continue to corrupt his conscience with stone dubiety by keeping a straight face. The CJN dare not pontificate on professional propriety ever. He will sound so shamelessly hypocritical.  He will now struggle so hard to spell the word: “corruption” correctly. None of those who defend him now for political safety will vow for his independence when their interest clashes with his. For I am doubly convinced if the CJN is without doubt about his innocence, he would not take the route of desperate escape he has chosen.

While the situation remains hopeless, it is left for Nigerians to determine what kind of a nation they desire.