In one fell swoop, the National Judicial Council (NJC) has queried 256 judges for judicial misconduct. This headlined its decisions taken at the 111th Council meeting in Abuja recently, where it also suspended two judges for one year without pay. The processes that led to these steps were painstaking, and included the dismissal of 73 other petitions.
Other decisions taken include the summoning of the Chief Judge of the Federal High Court and the Chief Judge, Kano State High Court, over conflicting orders, issuance of warning letters to three judges and barring their elevation to a higher bench for a period. Two other judges were placed on a “watch list” for two years and thereafter.
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The staggering number of suspected reprobates serving as officers in the temple of justice is indicative of the depth of decadence in the judiciary. For many, this is a familiar narrative, in view of what is already in the public domain. It is morally odious, to say the least.
The NJC meeting presided over by the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, did not give details of the nature of the judicial misconducts at issue, thus leaving the public imagination roaming wild. Since the CJN assumed office, she has always harped on the discipline, integrity and professionalism of all judicial officers, which are critical for judicial accountability and restoration of public confidence in the system. But it would appear that she is not being taken seriously.
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When judges are accused of misconduct, what easily comes to mind is the sale of justice to the highest bidder. This has been attested to by prominent former justices and senior lawyers. It fuels forum shopping by litigants, the rendering of conflicting judgements by courts of coordinate jurisdictions, reckless issuance of ex parte and restraining orders, disrespect of the hierarchy of courts, and dilatory tactics in the
handling of cases, among other such anomalies.
In bemoaning these judicial abuses, the Chairman of the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), Ola Olukoyede, revealed not long ago that restraining orders had shut the commission out of 15 states in the country.
The issuance of queries to judges is what the NJC, as the apex judicial disciplinary body, does every year in line with its statutory mandate. The escalation of cases, undoubtedly, strongly suggests the ineffectuality of its disciplinary approach. And amidst the increasing audacity of these bad eggs, what NJC needs is self-evaluation and a reset for impact. Over the years, the broad consensus of opinions is that its sanctions are no more than mere slaps on the wrist.
The office of a judge is a sacred one, adorned with a majestic aura, and held in awe for its immense powers in fostering justice in society. In jurisdictions where the rule of law is supreme, serious efforts are made to protect its integrity.
In the US, for instance, “Corruption in a judge’s seat does not go unpunished,” as stated by Richard Pilger, a US prosecutor, during the prosecution of Thomas Spargo, a New York State Supreme Court Justice involved in an attempted extortion and bribery. He was jailed for 27 months in 2009.
However, in sharp contrast, the NJC only retired a Justice of the Court of Appeal who demanded a bribe of ₦200 million to procure judgement in another Court of Appeal, in an election petition in 2016. In its report on that incident, the NJC said, “During deliberations, the council found as follows: that there was evidence that the petitioner met with Honourable Justice… thrice, in his residence in Sokoto, Gwarimpa, Abuja and Owerri, where on each occasion, he demanded from him the sum of N200 million to influence the Court of Appeal in Owerri or risk losing the case.”
The global best practice would have been to prosecute and jail such a judge. But this never happened. We don’t know of any judge who has been jailed for abuse of office in Nigeria, to serve as a deterrent to others. A few prosecutions were quashed with the feral esprit de corps often displayed by fellow judges.
As such, PREMIUM TIMES advocates a far more radical approach, in tandem with global best practices, for judges whose misconducts border on criminality to be made to face the full wrath of the law. This is the only way to restore discipline and integrity to the Bench.
By so doing, late Justice Kayode Esho of the Supreme Court, who used to speak about the obscene existence of “billionaire judges;” Justice Ayo Salami, who lost his job as President of the Court of Appeal for standing up against a former Chief Justice of Nigeria, who hijacked an election petition in the Sokoto division of his court, without any authority to do so; and other senior lawyers, who loudly decry judicial abuses, would not have tried in vain to sanitise the temple of justice.
We see a ringing indictment of the NJC in the reports of the National Bureau of Statistics and UNODC on the judiciary as being among Nigeria’s leading culprits in corruption, in their sectoral assessments. Also, is the cynical reality attributed to a leading Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) who claimed that there are two categories of lawyers in the country: Those who know the Law; and those who know the judges. This has unfortunately proven to be true, over and again.
For almost every desecration of the temple of justice and suborned judge in Nigeria, there appears to be a senior lawyer behind this. Which is why the EFCC chairman once stated that at least 100 SANs were undergoing prosecution for money laundering and the diversion of their clients’ monies.
ALSO READ: NJC suspends two judges, rejects eight others’ appeals, recommends 12 new appeal court justices
The fact that Justice Muhammed Shuaibu, the Presiding Judge of the Court of Appeal, Sokoto division, admitted at the North-Western Attorney-General’s Conference, years ago, that “Part of the problem in the fight against graft in the country are judges,” speaks volume. It was equally not much fun learning from Justice Musa Dattijo that “It has been in the public space that court officials and judges are easily bribed by litigants,” in his 2023 valediction.
In 2014, a former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mariam Aloma-Muhktar, had warned of the “rising culture” of lobbying and godfatherism in judicial appointments done by the NJC. Hence, the cradle of the judicial grime in the country is quite stark. Where the system doesn’t ensure that depraved judges end up in jail, the NJC may simply be digging a sinking holein its quest for sanity on the Bench.
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