How politicians are rubbishing the judiciary – Justice Abdullahi

You have dispensed justice at the judiciary during its golden days and even when it degenerated. From your experiences, can you look back about how the judiciary was some years ago when it was the epitome of integrity and now with its myriad of the problems? Really, I am in the position to say something […]

You have dispensed justice at the judiciary during its golden days and even when it degenerated. From your experiences, can you look back about how the judiciary was some years ago when it was the epitome of integrity and now with its myriad of the problems?

Really, I am in the position to say something about the judiciary in the good old days and what we have today.  Because I started first as a state counsel and after a year and a half I was posted as a magistrate in northern Nigeria. When I became a magistrate I met some of my senior colleagues who were chief magistrates. One of them is the former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Modibbo Alfa Belgore, the other one was the late Usman Muhammed. They really put me through as a magistrate. All together we shared the chamber, we sat together and we went out together until I was confident enough to start working alone. There was no rushing.  You had to go through the learning process until you were confident enough to be on your feet. Because they were always there and if there was any problem you always went back to them.

In those days the respect I enjoyed as magistrate I cannot compare it today with the respect a high court judge enjoys. The system was working. The real focus was service in a dignified manner. Everybody knew his place. The issue of anybody even thinking to offer bribe to a magistrate or a judge was unheard of. The friends we kept some were close relations; others were our friends right from the primary, secondary and even the university. Nobody was thinking how he could use that connection either to influence you or to bring somebody to influence you. It was such a glorious time. You wouldn’t think of anybody coming around to ask of any favour in the course of your duty. It was a stress free job. You enjoyed it and did it beyond your ability. The result was the general satisfaction in the society.

The hierarchy in the judiciary was well respected. It was not possible to walk into the chambers of the magistrate or a judge and start discussing the case no matter how closely related to you.  It was not that we didn’t have friends but the circle we kept was very narrow. As one grows older, your experience also improves. The relationship between the Bench and the Bar was that of utmost respect. The legal practitioners knew exactly what was expected of them. They came to the court decently dressed; the language they used was a respectable language.  You could hardly find a legal counsel telling his client let us go and approach a judge over an issue. The judiciary maintained a very dignified sacrosanct position.

In those days, even when judges were being appointed, they were subjected to thorough checks at every level. And having got cleared and getting appointed, you couldn’t for any reason think of doing anything that would tarnish your image; but protect the names of those that appointed you. So everyone was doing the right thing.

When states were created there had to be some expansions. There were deployments of judges to those states that were newly created for the dispensation of justice. Our colleagues were dispersed to various states from Kaduna. But at that time we already knew each other. By the time they got to their new stations they just continued what they had been doing. And the relationship continued.

But later the thorough back ground checks as well as other checks were a little bit relaxed when the new ones were coming.  But even then when you came in, for you to stay, you must keep the standard you met on ground. The dignity of the judiciary remained intact. Yes, sometimes, you might come across some youthful exuberance in some of the judges who qualified at a very young age. Even though being guided, sometimes you couldn’t control everything.

Up to the time that 12 states in the nation were created, the standard was high.  The influence of corruption on the judiciary at that time was still very little. Then, there was additional creation of states from 12 to 19, so there were further expansions. Those expansions caused some adverse effects. With the expansion, character was not confined to the original context. The judiciary was comfortably dignified. We kept the tradition of seclusion; you knew who your friends were. That trend continued for a long time.

I can say with an air of confidence that in the north up to 1976-77, it was fairly good. Then some additional courts were created. The system of appointment and supervision were too remote to check the conduct of the judicial officers. There was total relaxation of the system. Of course, the traditional norms were then being eroded. The facilities that were made available to the magistrates and judges to prevent them from temptations were becoming scarce. You find magistrates with no cars of their own. They have to use commercial vehicles to go their chambers.  The system starts having problems.  Like I said, supervision becomes very relaxed. It was not because there were no officers to do that, but the enormity of the problem was becoming larger. The semblance of providing to the judiciary was the kernel problem.  As well, the respect the judicial officers were getting started fading away.

But for quite a while the problems were more with the lower courts especially the magistrates. If you want to maintain a credible judiciary, you shouldn’t allow it to the extent of allowing the judges start going out to beg for money to build or furnish court or buy working materials. As a result of that the judiciary started getting assistance from the lawyers for example. The lawyer would come, wanting to file a case and there weren’t materials at the registry. The registrar would say would you buy us a rim of paper or something? To that extent, he is part of the system. As a lawyer, he is a member of the court so to speak. But it is a very bad situation. If he has to buy some things for the court, he surely expects some obligations from the court for his kindness. But right there, the dignity of the institution has been lowered. That is how it started like a joke; it reached where it is today.

Because of the mixture you get there are bound to be some disagreements and the way some would conduct themselves, might be different from the way others would.  Thus, there could be clash of opinions and when that happens, it could become a problem. And the system won’t operate smoothly. These things kept on creeping in silently. And public confidence is thereby eroded quickly too. It became a problem when cases started filing and people became uneasy with the judiciary. If somebody has a claim before the court and it keeps on dragging for a long time, definitely he would lose confidence in the court.If it is someone who believes in the fact that, ok let me try if my resources can bail me out, and he meets a weak judge, what do you expect? That is the beginning of the big problem. If the person didn’t get what he paid for, of course he would talk. Then the story would start going round.  It is something that is not meant to happen, if it happens, no matter how small, it becomes big news. Unfortunately, this started happening and the judiciary started losing the respect it used to enjoy. Some of the problems are internal while others are external. Some of the judges started associating with people they ought not to associate with. Or to be in places they ought not to be. Or do things they ought not to do and so on. These things culminated into what is happening in the judicial arena to day.

Some measures are being taken. But most of the times, they are too little, too late. Like I said, the problems are multifarious as you attend to one, another one rears its head. Before you realise it, you are surrounded by so many problems that make the atmosphere look very bleak.

But at any given time there are good judges: who live by their conscience, integrity and due process as best they can. Sometimes, it is the system which is so chaotic for them to be noticed. Always, a bad image shines faster than a good one. It’s the mind set of people to look for the bad image that would show that things are not right. That is why the judiciary is given bad image. People are saying that the judiciary is finished. But it is not finished since people are still going to court.

May be they are hoping against hope; saying let us go to court and see if we can get justice.

Yes, it is good to hope against hope. What brought out to the fore, the problems in the judiciary are the political cases. But there are regular cases going on and people are not complaining about them. But it is only when the judiciary is handling political cases that the hullabaloo starts. And the politicians know what they are doing.  The politician goes to the polls and loses. Then he heads to the courts, determined that he must get what he wants. And if he doesn’t get what he wants trouble starts.

That is why the National Judicial Commission (NJC) is flooded with plethora of petitions. Even today, we sat on about 45 petitions and complaints from various people.

Just like you have earlier spoken, what are the procedure you follow in empanelling the presidential election petition tribunal and do you equally come under undue pressure in doing that?

To me, I don’t have any pressure in empanelling the judges. Like I said, I don’t know the judges, they belong to the state high courts and they only come to me when they have been nominated by their chief judges. So, I have no reason for anybody asking me about the presidential or the electoral petitions tribunals. I remember in 1999 when I was presiding and it happened that my wife was a returning officer in Edo State then, so, I had to withdraw from the panel.

In 2003, I participated and we all knew the contestants. I will say it’s a very difficult period for me because one of the contestants was my class mate and we are very close all along. That is Buhari. So, it’s not an easy thing for me to do, though I raised the issue they said they didn’t mind and I continued.

But I don’t think there were a lot of things that came in between. It wasn’t arising from any pressure. For example, it was the time I was looking for a place to construct the present court of Appeal complex where I preside. A site was provided for in the Abuja master plan but I was prevented from starting the construction there. I don’t know why I couldn’t; up till now I don’t know why it was done that way. And I had already commissioned the consultants and building plan had been done. In fact, even the contract bill was signed for the constructions to start. But when the contractors came to start construction, they were chased away.

Was it before Malam Nasiru el-Rufa’i’s tenure?

It was before his tenure. So, when they were chased away, they came to tell me and I tried making enquiries but nobody could give me any answers. So, I said ok they should go back and continue but when they started somebody came and developed some huge boulders on the plot to show me that he was serious and he didn’t want me to continue. I was almost giving up before one of the counsels appearing before the tribunal observed that the place, where the tribunal was sitting was filled up because it was too small. It was such that once we start sittings, a lot of people would have to remain outside.

So, the issue of the size of the court came up and some of the lawyers who approached me said why couldn’t we move somewhere else, I said to them that we were not moving anywhere because that is the only place I have, the one I had wanted to start building, I had been stopped by some powerful elements somewhere I don’t know. So, one of them offered that he could assist and I said fine if he could. He made an arrangement for me to see the president to talk about it. He said that he thought he could be able to sort out the problems or have something done from the villa. I said it was fine, if he could do that. So, they gave us an appointment and I took along with me all the judges, who were in Abuja, with the chief registrar, the consultants and the lawyer and we went to see President Olusegun Obasanjo.

We all went to the villa and he asked what could he do for us and I explained to him what happened. Then, he asked did we have the plan and I said yes, because I took the plan with me. He looked through it and said but this is the place for Court of Appeal because it was written there in the plan. He then said, what was the problem?  I said the problem was there inside the villa. He said how could that be? I said nobody could do what he did if he was not from the villa and I didn’t know who he was. Obasanjo said I should leave it to him and he would get back to us. So, we left him.

Unfortunately, that visit was misinterpreted to mean that we might have been summoned and been given instructions on how we should decide the case or certain pending others before us.  It was a very nice day, so we took it in good faith. We tried to explain but that was the only rare incident that took place in the whole process.

I think when el -Rufa’i came on board, he wanted to insist that we must do it on another site. He caused a lot of problems too.  But we had met with lots of stumbling blocks. He was one of them. He had to go and look for another side for us; we suggested other places which he turned down. He said that he could not in all honesty demolish people’s properties because they were not built in accordance with the Abuja master plan and then he himself would now go and distort that plan. He said he would not do it. And then what happened eventually, he just came in one afternoon into my office and said, sir, you can now build on your plot. How did you come about that? I asked him. He just raised his shoulders and walked away. He didn’t even allow me to escort him. But apart from that we didn’t have any pressure from any quarters.

In the elections petitions tribunal, we discover that in most cases, those in the opposition are always the losers. Why is it so?

No, it’s not. You see, election petition matters are very unique proceedings. There are things you can do that help your case. There are things you will not do that will be disadvantage to you. May be, you even have the materials but if you do not utilize them, then it may come against you. The trial depends upon the preparation of the lawyers to the parties. If the lawyers know what to do and they prepare well right from the word go, they won’t have problems. There shouldn’t be any missing links in the electoral petition but if there is any missing link it would tell on the petition. You may have the witnesses, you may have the evidence, but there are some standards that you have to meet. Some of the tribunals indeed take time.

For instance, in Anambra the tribunal spent over two years doing one case. This is because those in power didn’t want the proceedings to end in time so that they wouldn’t vacate office.  So, they decided to bring about 400 witnesses. Even after the verdict was given, the judges explained their reasons for taking whatever decision they took. You will see them in the judgement. It is not just a blanket approach to the issue. Results can equally turn out differently at the Court of Appeal because they have more time, more experienced judges than the tribunal among other factors.  The way the appeal court looks at these things differs from the way the tribunal does. The appellate court, for instance, looks at the quality of the evidence presented at the tribunal. The quality of the evidence is very important in determining your case. It is not a deliberate thing.

Some judges hand out frivolous injunctions to politicians which slow the political process. The INEC chairman, for instance, cried recently that the electoral body is loaded with hundreds of injunctions that hinder its preparations for the polls. The Chief Justice of Nigeria equally warned judges over the same issue. But the judges seem to take pleasure in doing so. Why?

I am endorsing the frivolous injunctions issue by courts. The issue of injunction has been a thorny issue in the judicial administration. The purpose of injunction is to use it to avert a problem or a danger that can cause permanent damage. It is not supposed to be permanent for over long period of time. It is supposed to be for short time where other party would come and be heard. But the thing is, in political cases every day counts. People take pains when people jump from one court to another. There is what we called abuse of court and some cases were lost because of that. It is a situation where a person would go to a court and file a case and then again jump to another one and file another matter. The law is not very clear on the issue of jurisdiction. People come to Abuja because the principal officers of most of the political parties are in Abuja. That is why Abuja became very attractive. It is very easy for them to serve the principal officers of these parties.

Is it appropriate for a party that loses an election to sue INEC in the case? We thought that INEC should come as a witness instead. What is the legal position?

Ideally, INEC is an independent arbiter. But unfortunately, INEC is in problem because some of its officials get involved in election malpractices.  May be with training and retraining it could be able to get firm and respectable officials who would play their parts in elections as independent arbiters. You will find that INEC would have little problem and its credibility would be assured. But for now this is a battle they have to fight because they have not reached their ideal destination. Eventually, with the good leadership they started to have, they may reach there one day.