Don’t Destroy The Judiciary To Save The Party -By Nkem Ikenegbu

In the future that must come, historians will be plodding through mountains of documents. They will be in search of the how and why Nigerians came to this sordid pass. In the course of their search, a document will hold a prime and pivotal place. That document will end up as famous, not necessarily for what it said, as for what it didn’t or craftily avoided to say. The document is the interview Professor Itse Sagay granted a great national paper, The Saturday Telegraphy. The front page interview ran under ‘‘Sagay: I doubt if Supreme Court will upturn decisions on Rivers, Akwa Ibom elections.’’

First of all the careful historian will notice the ‘deliberately fixed’ attributions to Sagay, as was perhaps demanded by him? According to the intro, ‘’Sagay is a professor of law, a renowned constitutional lawyer and senior advocate of Nigeria [SAN]’’…. Yet, despite the correctness of the assertions it is a prudently expurgated CV.

To appreciate what happened, just imagine that one wanted to describe President Muhammadu Buhari in his current incarnation. And one merely states that Buhari was a General, a former military dictator and serial presidential contender. And the same biographer mysteriously left out that Buhari is a sitting president. A careful historian will sense that this is a purposed missing link. It is such ‘missing links’ that if pursued will expose ‘everything’. So rather than gloss over it, the historian will dig in further.

Now Professor Sagay is currently, perhaps feverishly famous, because he has just been appointed to head the Presidential Advisory Committee against Corruption, PACC. That is to say if Sagay has a CV credit that is it. But the fact of his headship of PACCC was prudently skimmed out.

Of course PACC is a quasi-autonomous non/governmental organization, more famously known as quango. And quangos reached their greatest heights of infamy in the hands of caudillos [military or military derived leaders] of Latin American. And it is on record that they used it to debase, coopt and corrupt, not just the judiciary, but almost all other segments of society. So a quango is like an institutional bagman of government. That is while they may exhibit the innocence of not being government, quangos are the ‘unseen’ monkey paws that stirs the sorcerer’s pots.

Now even if the interviewer made the innocent slip of not properly designating Sagay, why did Sagay who is in an autumnal career boom as a Nigerian-style sage and moralist, even if on government retainership, not do full disclosures, not show utmost good faith, by declaring his interests and a priori positions on the matter; that he is heading a quango? Why did it pay him or his retainers not to do full disclosures?

And the matter gets interesting. The point is that the judiciary is under intemperate siege, contemning and distrainment by the executive. But to get a fuller picture let us quote Ekiti’s governor, Fayose, in a subject matter that is common knowledge. ‘’I was listening to the president on the television. He said somebody stole and some people are somewhere suffering. Is the president now a law unto himself? Is he a judge in his own matter?’’ Premium Times, 23-01-16.

And to aid the presidency, other operatives of the executive and associated departments, have openly been boasting, threatening and accusing the judiciary that they are to be soon jailed and or dismissed as if the judiciary and judges were their houseboys.

Now the picture begins to emerge. Professor Sagay is a head of a quango. And that quango is funded by the APC government of the day. So, what he says can be in justice taken to represent the desires, delegated desires, instructions and threats of the government in matters at issue.

And what exactly did he say in the said interview in issue? Magisterially Sagay concluded: ‘’So, I would be very surprised if there is any change at the Supreme Court.’’ For any unsophisticated reader it is all a harmless speak.

But consider that lawyers since the times of Socrates – the sophists – have been tutored in the use of rhetoric as tools of warfare, to bludgeon, persecute and browbeat, just as an assassin would, with his hidden daggers. So Sagay’s choice of words are to be taken as cold and deliberate. And he says he will be surprised, repeat surprised, and necessarily in disagreement or otherwise with the verdict.

Now, Robert Clarke, SAN is one of the most informed, senior and big ticket lawyers. In the 3rd week of January he was famously at Channels’ Sunrise television belt. And he wisely railed against lawyers, especially senior lawyers, who indulge in speculative propositioning of judgements in matters that are before their justices. It was not only in his learned opinion sub judice, it was professionally unethical, unbecoming and finally disgraceful. It was not the duty of the bar to canvass or prescribe how the justices of the law will come out with their judgements. In fact he called on other senior lawyers to close ranks and fight this desecration of the hallowed temple of justice by area-boy lawyers, one could say, whatever their status, moralism, alleged reputation or age at the bar?

And Sagay is a senior lawyer and teacher of laws. He should on the law of averages know that lawyers should not indulge in propositioning or speculating on judgements of the justices. He should know that these judgements are not like shares and stocks, or even Baba Ijebu lotto magic winning numbers.

Yet the professor did exactly that. Now, with the combination of the ways of this administration, its impulses, statements and body language or odor, against the judiciary, and Sagay’s prudent choice of legal vernaculars, it is certain that his intention and or what can be deduced from what he says is: that the judgement of the Supreme Court did better go this government-approved way, or the Supreme Court judges would have surprised government.

– Ikenegbu,(Dr) sent in this piece from Abuja.