Before His Excellency, Mr. Peter Obi, runs again for president (part 3/4)
“In the locus classicus of Garba v University of Maiduguri, which deals with the issue of Right to Fair Hearing, Justice Chukwudifu Oputa said: ‘God has given you two ears. Hear both sides.’” - Muntasir Speaks (Legal blogger)
Judiciocracy is a system of government where judges choose the political leaders. It was invented for Nigeria. Nigeria's judiciary is broken, and there appears to be no path to redemption. Their participation in Nigeria's democracy has thus become untenable. For the worse, in this electoral cycle, the judiciary has ordered the people to forfeit their stolen mandate for president and has also overturned an inordinately high number of electoral returns — governors and legislators. In this judicial overreach, they have treated INEC as surplus to requirement.
Moreover, the 44 years that separate the Shagari v Awolowo thriller in Atanda Fatai Williams's Supreme Court and the judicial offering we got this time ‘round are incomparable. At the Appeal Court, it was a curious thing to observe INEC join Tinubu's lawyers to mount a joint defence of a dubious mandate.
The Appeal Court Regarded INEC as “The Untouchables”
It was even curiouser to observe Justice Haruna Tsammani and the other members of the Presidential Election Petitions Tribunal (Appeal Court) shield INEC from interrogation by the petitioners. For the duration of the court, therefore, INEC's Alhaji Mahmood Yakubu was never called to demonstrate the process which he used to arrive at the returns he announced.
So it was decidedly a farce, on judgment day, when the same judges said the petitioners had failed to prove—from the preponderance of blurred, mutilated, and forged forms and documents—that INEC’s conclusion was wrong. In the end, it was the considered opinion of the Appeal Court that the bad faith failures of documentation by INEC were the gains of Senator Tinubu.
The Supreme Court agreed and tossed out Mr. Peter Obi's petition, with extreme prejudice, for “lack of merit”.
Does Nigeria’s Body of Benchers have a Counterpart in the U.S?
"I'm happy to (recognize) professional ... those who are well-equipped in litigation matters or electoral disputes—Chief Wole Olanipekun and AG Lateef Fagbemi—as masters and experts!" - Justice Mary Odili
To be fair, we can't talk of a corrupt judiciary and exempt the attorneys and barristers and solicitors who practice in court. Every lawyer is an officer of the court. Judges sitting on the bench and attorneys perched at the bar are expected to work together to deliver wholesome, fair, and impartial justice to the citizen.
#ALLEYESONTHEJUDICIARY
Peter Obi had assembled a cast of brilliant attorneys and learned gentlemen to recover his stolen mandate. But against a rogue opponent, they were handicapped by their own ethics and high-mindedness. They had no John Grisham-character who thinks outside the box. From the metaphorical bleachers, I thought this legal contest could have benefitted from intervention by the court of public opinion.
Afterall, the #AllEyesOnTheJudiciary campaign on social media, promoted by the Obi-dient Movement, seemed to have gotten the attention of the judges. It had perhaps prompted Justice Mary Odili's pep talk for the bench.
Who Will Strike the First Blow to Redeem the Judiciary?
“If you are a judge and you corrupt, where do we go from there? Then everything has to come to a halt. If the legislature is corrupt, you go to the judiciary for redress. If the executive is corrupt, you go to the judiciary for remedy. And if the judiciary itself is corrupt, where do we go from there?” — Justice Chukwudifu Oputa
It's a mark of American Exceptionalism that David Boies, who argued Al Gore's case before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2000, gave interviews and freely expressed his colourful opinion about — the judges, Governor Jeb Bush, and Katherine Harris, Secretary of State of Florida. See also, “Rise of the Machines” by David Boies in the New York Times.
That said, it would be an act of mercy—which posterity will appreciate—for Dr Livy Uzoukwu, Chief Awa Kalu, and Dr Onyechi Ikpeazu to tell us what happened in that court. In a manner of speaking, that is an aspect of judicial independence. The court system shouldn't be a secret society.
https://medium.com/@vickynwugo/peter-obi-can-learn-from-ross-perot-barack-obama-ac3b417751e7
