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MONDAY QUARTER-BACKING: On the Matter of Trampling on the Temple of Justice in Ekiti State
by
Mobolaji E. Aluko, PhD
September 29, 2014
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My People:
My dear Ekiti State is in the news again - and I don't like it one bit. We are barely recovering from the charade of "stomach infrastructure" elections, and now it is a descent in and out of courthouse into an orgy of violence, with loss of life, limb and property (see attached pictures)......
And into rank partisanship....which must have its limits. On this occasion, partisans are exceeding their limits egregiously (PDP & co.), or else personalizing matters too much (APC & co.).
So please come with me........
1. In ALL my monitoring of political activities in Nigeria over the years, this is the VERY FIRST TIME EVER that I have heard that a court/courtroom/judges was/were ASSAULTED because an UNFAVORABLE decision was either ARRIVED AT and ANNOUNCED (in Ado-Ekiti High Court, on Monday September 21, on a purely jurisdictional question, which is the very first bus stop of any case) or ANTICIPATED (on Thursday September 25, at the commencement of the Election Petition Tribunal ). Yes, a court decision may be ignored, or its sitting arranged to be POSTPONED or DELAYED indefinitely until it becomes moot - there were a lot of these situations during the Atiku-Obasanjo imbroglio leading up to Atiku's candidacy in 2007 or so - but to INVADE the court to protest a decision/protest an anticipated judgment has been unheard of to me in Nigeria's annals. There can be protests IN THE STREETS after a decision, but the COURTHOUSE and the JUDGE are invariably immune from physical danger, if not immune from "mouth abuse" or loss/smearing of reputation - like Ikpeme of the Abiola fame or Salami of the Fayemi fame.
2. One should ask: is it REASONABLE to expect a case to be judged differently or truncated permanently simply because there is a violent reaction IN COURT? Will we in future expect a band of armed-robber colleagues to INVADE a court when the robbers understand that a leader of their gang is surely going to be imprisoned? How bizarre! It was really a stupid protest.
3. Now the fact of the matter is that the ONLY beneficiary in the TRUNCATION of the cases in the two courts - if the hearings are postponed indefinitely never to resume - is Governor-Elect Fayose. In both hearings, he did not have to be PRESENT for the proceedings to occur - but he made himself present in the second courthouse, leading to speculations as to whether he administered a slap or two to the hapless Judge (who I understand happened to be a friend of Fayose merely pleading with him to intervene to stop the commotion), or supervised the plenitude of slaps and sartorial re-arrangements of the Judge's now malfunctioned attire.
4. The Opposition is wrong to make a case that Fayose slapped the Judge. Does that make the melee more serious or what? In my mind, not at all. ANYBODY with a little bone of justice would be HORRIFIED at the report, whether Fayose was present or not. It is IMMATERIAL whether it was he who delivered the slap. What matters was that several Judges were assaulted.
5. But Fayose was present...see attached picture. So what the heck was the Governor-Elect doing there? It is true that on too many occasions, days of court judgment in Nigeria become theaters of political spectacle by those who expect favorable judgment or otherwise, but at least, in Fayose's absence on this particular occasion, deniability of being an on-the-scene slapper or supervisor would have been avoided - unless his presence was what was pre-determined to cause the melee. In any case, what did he do to prevent the melee? Do we have evidence of his clothes being torn as he tried to restrain his people? Rather, what we hear afterwards are statements that there is an attempt to steal his mandate, and that "I will not go down cheaply like Oni." That is pregnant with meaning - an admission that he might EVENTUALLY go, but not without fighting, judicial or otherwise?
6. A further question is to be asked: which Chief Judge who was assaulted will now administer an oath to the incoming Governor on October 16? A Judge who has just been slapped by the supporters of the Governor-elect in that incoming Governor's presence? In fact, the Chief Judge has shut down the courts in Ekiti (see attached press release) because it appears that the Police and other Security forces in the state could not protect the Judiciary on Monday or Thursday, when on the latter day, the mayhem should have been taken in the already-charged political atmosphere. So what we have brewing, what we may be facing is a constitutional crisis of a judicial boycott of events relating to the incoming administration, unless certain firm guarantees of protection are given..
7. Perhaps the most serious issue is that the substantive case being tried is virtually an open-and-shut case to my mind. BEFORE the election, a group of interested persons had sued that because of the 10-year-rule of impeachment vis-a-vis ineligibility, Fayose was NOT qualified since he was impeached only 8 years ago, without a successful appeal against it. In any arithmetic, 8 is less than 10 - and the case should have been determined as an accelerated case BEFORE the election. However, as is oftentimes the case in Nigeria, raw politics intrudes, making a candidate to be offered up in the face of overwhelming negative disqualifying counts, political bet-making made a court to ask that we wait till AFTER the election to see whether the case would then be moot (in the event that Fayose lost, which he did not) while impunity enables certain actors to ignore that arithmetic, hoping to get people to go along with it...
But not this time yet. The issue of locus standi of the plaintiffs has been settled, and the next one of jurisdiction was settled on Monday - and next is the substantive issue in the same court. If it is ruled a pre-election issue - which is unlikely, since the case was filed BEFORE the election - then no problem. If it is not, and an unfavorable result (to Fayose) is delivered, can we not wait for that, and possibly appeal it? Until ALL of us, partisans and non-partisans, obey the rule of law, whether it is favorable to us or not, we will not go anywhere as a nation.
Whatever be the case, these are dark days again for Ekiti. We pride ourselves to be the most educated state in Nigeria, but Which kin' education be dat one?
And there you have it.
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