Category: Femi Orebe

I think the Supreme Court of Nigeria carried Fundamental Human Rights and Freedom of Association too far when it permitted households to form political parties. Ideally Nigeria does not need more than three political parties. This will save cost and emphasise manifestoes and ideologies”, – PA Okoobo, February, 2017.

How Nigerians would now wish Baba’s advice, given three years ago, were heeded before the recent elections.

Odioma G.O Okoobo, FCA, one of Nigeria’s first set of British-trained professional accountants, has lived an absolutely active, indeed checkered, life both in his career as a trained accountant and as an incomparable community leader, giving his all to everything he touched.  Papa, without a doubt,  one of my very loyal readers, who has many times sent me some seminal interventions one of which I published and from which the opening quote comes from,, will be telling his own life story here in what he calls: A DIVINE CALL TO SERVE.

He turned 90 on terra firma on Wednesday March 13, 2019. God be praised.

Rather than gloat, it is with absolute gratitude to God that he told his story so he could set an example in community service for younger generations.

Happy reading.

From a very tender age, I have always found myself being called upon to serve in one capacity or the other. As an Accounts Clerk in UAC in Warri between 1951- 58 I was Secretary of Irrua Improvement Union. We later founded the Youth Wing of the Ishan Union with me emerging President, and Sir Matthew Otaigbe,as Vice President.  As Chief Accountant with the now defunct Midwestern Nigeria Marketing Board, I spare-headed the formation of a Co-operative Society in 1964, with many Irrua young elites resident in Benin City, as members.

Also  as Assistant General Manager(Operations)  with the New Nigerian  Bank, I ensured that the Irrua Branch was among the first 12 to be established.  I gave the same priority to the establishment of Idumebo Primary School the highlight of which was one of the invitees, Mr. Ghoshi, a Lebanese offering a University scholarship to Idumebo Community.

At the instance of Late Admiral Augustus Aikhomu, I undertook the establishment of Irrua Community Bank in 1992 with the assistance of Chief Isaac Ekeoba, FNIQS with Gilbert Eigbobo as its first manager. I was its first Chairman.

The Bendel State Government appointed me Chairman, Board of Trustees of Irrua Girls Secondary School for four year (1989-1992) just as it later appointed me Chairman of Bendel Steel Structures, Efurrun. It was during my tenure that the Company paid dividend to the Bendel State Government for the very first time since its establishment.

As an Elder in Idumebo Community to which I relocated in September 2009, my first assignment was to undertake a FUND RAISER to prosecute the land case we had with Imule Community in Illeh, Ekpoma. I chaired the Committee which administered the funds and as an ex-banker, I made sure that checks and balances were in place. I handed over after two years,

With the passing into glory of some older members of the IDUMEBO ELDERS EXECUTIVE COUNCIL, and the incapacitation, by old age, of two others the lot fell on me to take up the mantle of leadership of the council. I immediately drew up an INSTRUMENT to establish Idumebo Elders Executive Council to administer the affairs of the Community with me as Executive Chairman. The INSTRUMENT was duly executed by the EDION NE NEN – Pa. Amin Ohio, Pa. Wallace Eigbobo, myself, Godwill Oseghale Okoobo,  and High Chief Dan A. Osara.

Essentially the Council consisted of all the Elders and Chiefs as well as three Igenes drawn from each of the five (5) Quarters in the community.

As was to be expected, with me as the first ever well educated professional, with wide experience, manning the affairs of the community, the die-hard traditionalists naturally objected to some of the changes we introduced.

As the oldest Christian in the Community, and Patron of the 15 churches in the Community, I am working with the Pastors to intensify evangelisation of those who are yet to embrace Christianity.

The target is that by 2020 up to 99% of the Idumebo Community, home and abroad, would be Christians. Many of these activities have met with hostilities and it was no surprise when I was recently fined N100,000.00k, and a goat, for allegedly breaching a law which never existed in the community until it was recently maliciously introduced.

However, with God on our side, Victory is assured.

Magdalene Omozele Okoobo Foundation

After more than a decade of procrastination, I finally inaugurated the Magdalene Omozele Okoobo Foundation on 13th March, 2017 on the occasion of my 88th birthday. My late, eldest daughter Magdalene, a graduate who was working with a Pharmacy in London, came home for a native law and custom wedding.

After the event at my residence in Idumebo,  Irrua and on her way back to Benin City, she was involved in auto accident and died the following day 10th December, 1990.The Foundation caters for widows, destitute, the aged, pregnant women needing caesarian operation etc.

Also catering for indigent widows, the Foundation hosts them three times a year: in April, August and December.

At the first and second events, the Foundation gives out N5,000.00 and a carton of indomine to each widow. At the December event, they receive N8, 000.00, and a quarter bag of rice each, while the orphanage receives N10,000.00 and a bag of rice. At the last event in December 2018, 28 indigent widows drawn from Idumebo, Idumabi, Usenu, Akho, Agua and Eko- Iyobhebhe Communities were hosted. The target is to cover Esan Central Local Government Area in future, subject to availability of funds.

Abstinence from smoking, drinking and womanising

As a young man I indulged in the above. Several times I tried to stop smoking but without success. However, around 10 pm on 5th May, 1985 I was watching TV when Pastor Oritsejafor appeared and said: “I was a smoker and a drinker but since I found Christ, my life has never been the same again.”

There and then, I told my wife who was watching with me that the Pastor was speaking to me. I put my pipe down and I did not smoke again that night. Nothing special happened that first night, but at about

midnight the following day, I found myself standing about twelve feet away from my bed. I opened my mouth and started chanting: “Satan I have killed you, in the name of Jesus Christ, I will never smoke again” And As if the blood in my body was congealing, I started beating my hands, legs and body. The chanting went on for about two minutes and I sweated before I went back to bed. The following day I went to Lagos on my way to Daura to have a meeting (in company of other people) with late Emir of  Daura. The same experience played out while  I was sleeping at Bristol Hotel in Lagos. The intensity reduced until about the seventh day when I completely stopped.

I used to drink beer but I never drank more than a bottle at a sitting. As a member of the Charismatic Renewal in the Catholic Church, I used to attend Sunday School Classes after Sunday Mass at St. Maria Goretti Catholic Church, Benin City. A lady who taught us was always talking about a little wine being good for the body. As I could not determine what a little wine could be in terms of beer I simply quit drinking alcohol altogether.

As for womanising, I told myself: “since I could stop smoking in which I had indulged myself for more than 30 years (from cigarette, cigar, to pipe) and has also stopped drinking beer, to stop womanising would be quite easy for me. All I did was to kneel before the Blessed Sacrament of the Church and also before the image of the Blessed Virgin Mary and declared with a COVENANT “from now on, I will not sleep with any woman unless she is my wife and bears my name.”

Since then, I have not broken the COVENANT.

This abstinence from smoking, drinking and womanising has had a tremendous positive effect in my physical, mental and spiritual life such that since 1985 I have become “a candidate for heaven”. I now believe that in whatever one is involved in, no matter how, or what, one can only make a success of it if one regards the task as one “in the service of God”. I pray that the Almighty God will give me more years to serve Him through Magdalene Omozele Okoob Foundation and my Community, in Jesus Name,

Amen.

 

Happy birthday, Sir, May your life continue to be a shining example to others.

 

Many happy returns.

However, two things must now concentrate the president as he goes into his final term: his impact on Nigeria/ Nigerians, and his place in history.

At his victory in 2015, I felt giddy enough to literally go on a binge, on these pages, drawing up agenda upon agenda, for the president -elect. After all, here was a man about whom I had written, claiming unashamedly, that Nigeria needed, much more than he needed Nigeria. That was in the process of canvassing his choice ahead of the APC presidential primaries.

And I wasn’t kidding.

Honest Nigerians knew that Buhari packed a punch; that he is mightily disciplined and highly focussed. He had been there before and even though for a short while, the country experienced order, and discipline, both of which were lacking in the Jonathanian years, especially.

We have now had four years of a Buhari presidency and many can testify to it that he worked his hands and hearts out especially on the promises he made to Nigerians about: Security, fighting corruption and the economy.

He recorded significant achievements in infrastructural procurement, enhanced security by substantially degrading Boko Haram, and although some naysayers denigrate his anti corruption war, it will be beyond the likes of Deziani Maduekwe from whom over a trillion naira and scores of eye-popping mansions have been retrieved, to ever say that his anti-corruption war is ineffective.

Unfortunately, the fact that he gave power devolution, which his party promised a wide berth, rankles to no end just as the blood- letting by murderous Fulani herdsmen, and his skewed appointments will always remain a blight on his administration.

However, two things must now concentrate the president as he goes into his final term: his impact on Nigeria/ Nigerians, and his place in history.

And to help him on these huge challenges, I present below, the views, slightly edited for space,  of Professor (Senator) Banji Akintoye, an elder statesman, offered way back  2015, but which remains as relevant today, as ever.

I wish the president God speed.

NIGERIA: THIS IS REAL CHANGE

President Buhari promised change, and thank God, he is delivering. Reports have it that the Federal Government is searching for, finding and recovering huge sums of public money stolen and hidden away by high public officials, and that panic is mounting among corrupt  former public officials. The U.S. government and some other foreign governments are reported to be offering assistance. All this, however, will be change on the surface. He will need soon to begin to deal with the fundamental corruption that has been ruthlessly destroying our country. The fundamental corruption in Nigeria is the stealing of all our country’s resources and putting them in the hands of the federal government. Most of this disaster was wrought by the military dictatorships from 1966-99. The greed of the federal government to control the Niger Delta oil started the disease. After that, it was decided to seize control of all other resources. And so, decree followed upon decree vesting all of Nigeria’s coastal lands in the federal government, then land along all waterways, then agricultural export produce, then VAT (value-added tax) collected from businesses operating in the states – and on and on and on.

The outcome was that the federal government became a ponderous and hideously corrupt establishment throwing funds around in a sickening frenzy, spreading corruption everywhere, interfering with, obstructing and disrupting state government functions, destroying state and local development initiatives, wrecking the integrity of all agencies of governance, insensitively promoting poverty all over our country and, above all, employing its  massively corrupt influence to frustrate any kind of change.

And what have been the consequences of this mother of corruptions? Elections have become federal wars against the people of Nigeria. The police, courts and even the military are riddled and paralysed with corruption. Schools, colleges and universities across our country have drastically lost quality as providers of education – and many of our university graduates are hardly literate these days. We have lost most of our world market share in such crops as cocoa, palm produce, groundnuts, gum-arabic, etc, exports that used to spread money out to our farmers. Deprived of the regional support systems that had maximized them in the 1950s, our cocoa exports fell by half from 1965 to 1980, our groundnut exports fell from 765,000 tons in 1968 to only 25,000 tons by 1973, our palm produce, cotton  and gum-arabic exports virtually disappeared . Many of the industries ambitiously established by our governments in the pre-independence years have closed their doors. In large parts of Nigeria, farming has weakened sharply, with the result that we are now a large importer of food. In most parts of our country, the spirit of enterprise has vanished, with most citizens hustling for a share of the revenues generated from oil.

By 2011, the Nigerian National Bureau of Statistics announced that 60.9% of Nigerians were living in “absolute poverty”. Unemployment among Nigerian youths is one of the highest in the world. Various kinds of violent crimes have turned Nigeria into one of the most unsafe places in the world.

The Nigerian picture is filled with grotesque facts and stories. The Niger Delta produces most of the revenue upon which the Nigerian corruption emporium rests; but the Niger Delta remains neglected and brutalized. After the states of the Niger Delta, Lagos State commands the richest resources and revenue in Nigeria. From VAT alone, Lagos State earns hundreds of billions of naira per annum; but the federal government takes it all and llsends back anly a little part of it – meaning that the federal government is robbing Lagos heavily every year. Droughts and the expanding desert have been blasting our cattle-herding folks in the far North for decades. Many who have lost their cattle have become gangs of cattle thieves, (now kidnappers) and their attacks on the rest, together with losses of grazing land, have been pushing large numbers of cattle herders southwards, resulting in violent clashes between cattle herders and farming folks far Southwards (especially in the  Middle Belt, Southwest and Southeast). Nigeria’s corruption-ridden federal authorities have had no respectable answer to this growing chain of disasters.

(Now to the answer, the long road).

President Buhari needs to recognise very quickly, therefore, that the real task that must be done to effect change in Nigeria is to shear down the excessive powers and resource control now vested in the federal government. It is worth repeating that the excessive accumulation of powers and resource control in the hands of the federal government is the first major corruption, and the source of all other kinds of corruption, in Nigeria.  As fast as possible, we must restore the energy of regional and local initiatives and enterprise in our country – and to do this we must have viable states, and we must take away much of the power and resource control now vested in the federal government and give them to the viable states. If these things are not done, any change that Buhari may carry out would be merely cosmetic – and corruption will return in full strength.

When Dr. Goodluck Jonathan became our president, there was great hope that he would lead our country to whittle down the federal government and lead us into a proper and rational federation. The hopes were high because he came from the Niger Delta, the region that has always led the resistance to excessive federal resource control. But that was, at best, a forlon hope. We believe we can expect better from Buhari. We believe that he does understand what Nigeria represents – for us Nigerian citizens, for the Black man in the world, and for Africa.

We are aware that Buhari has some serious background baggage to deal with. His Fulani people, for instance, fear losing their position in a restructured Nigeria. Finding themselves in control of federal power at independence, they naturally calculated that they should do everything to keep their federal position and ensure that the federal government controls everything. They have done a good job of that. But, unfortunately, their success in this is destroying Nigeria. The federal behemoth they created can no longer continue if Nigeria is to remain one country. Buhari must, therefore, deal in a statesmanlike manner with the fears of his people, and get them to subscribe to the development of a proper Nigerian federation; a country of open and decent democratic politics, of good education, vibrant enterprise, equitable opportunities for all citizens, and good chances of prosperity for all. We wish him luc

PDP rigging plans for D day were more dangerous and ramifying; justifying President Buhari’s order concerning those who might be tempted to snatch ballot boxes.

“Even though people say the choice between the two leading presidential candidates in the persons of the incumbent President, Muhammadu Buhari, and former Vice President,Abubakar Atiku,  is between a tweedle dee and a tweedledum, I say we cannot have a starker choice between Buhari and Atiku. The difference is between light and darkness, between day and night, between going forward to the next level and going back to the years of yore. I am clear in my mind that Nigeria would not go back to Egypt but go on to Canaan as we say in my church and as the inimitable Kenneth Ozumba  Mbadiwe would have said, “forward ever backward never”.

That was how my ever perspicacious senior (at Christ’s School, ADO-EKITI, that is, Emeritus Professor Jide Osuntokun) captured the postponed election in his column in the Thursday, February 21, 2019 edition of  this paper.

Were the election not divinely postponed, desperados who, during their 16 year stranglehold on Nigeria brought it to its lowest ebb, would have rigged themselves back into power from which they had humiliatingly been excluded for close on 4 years having been sent packing in 2015 even at the very apogee of their unaccountable reign.

But how would the APC have explained that PDP sent them packing in return, rigging or no rigging? Who would even have believed?

So much did these questions weigh on my mind, and so pissed off was I with the APC leadership which, I concede, had been fighting a just battle against its own closet emperors who had been playing God, distracting the party, that I reacted to a Face book post as follows:

“Kunle, all this is fine, but please do you have the faintest idea, besides fighting the closet emperors within its ranks, what the APC was busy doing when PDP rifled through INEC; pocketing RECs, straight down to literally handing over names of adhoc staff to INEC all over Nigeria? That done PDP now knows everything happening within the commission right up to being briefed, according to the APC Chairman, of the impending election postponement so that the PDP will not waste its ‘meagre’ financial resources.

How do you change this looming disaster in five days and what, by the way, were the intelligence agencies doing when INEC was being ‘bought’. Was it overconfidence or sheer carelessness on the part of APC, or a misbegotten belief that they were up against a decent people as against a set of gbewiris- people with no conscience at all?”

PDP’s rigging plans didn’t start today but was a long haul. It had started with the recruitment of a thoroughly discredited former INEC Chairman who presided over a Nigerian election that was worse than elections in Myanmar according to a former U. S. Secretary of state who served as election observer, as consultant, and followed it up with the recruitment of a U S consulting firm.

This was soon followed up by an atrocious, daily lampooning of INEC – actually a decoy to mask the fact that they had successfully infiltrated the commission through some of its very top officers, incidentally from the same part of the country, with responsibility for its most critical electoral functions. They raised all manner of allegations and attacked every institution involved in the electoral process in order to divert attention from their devious agenda. They even “discredited INEC’s new election guidelines which include simultaneous accreditation and voting, and which also barred collation officers from making or receiving calls on Election Days”, according to a release by the Buhari Media Group.

Obviously, the disinformation part must have been a contribution of their US consultant borrowing from the Cambridge Analytica negative impact on the Clinton 2015 campaign.

PDP rigging plans for D day were more dangerous and ramifying; justifying President Buhari’s order concerning those who might be tempted to snatch ballot boxes.

We would come to that later.

In the meantime they have imported into the country huge amounts of U.S dollars, a large portion of which government has warned is fake, with which they purchased literally every segment of society; not just those with a role to play in the elections.

Like their one time poster girl, Deziani, but with amounts that will now shame the empress who some of those she bribed to alter results of the 2015 presidential election results have since been jailed, PDP is believed to have bought from RECs down to hundreds of thousands of adhoc staff whose names, compromised RECs in most of the states got from their minders in PDP.

The police and members of the intelligence services have also allegedly got their fair share of the huge bribes.

As President Jonathan did not fail to do in 2015, I am sure that PDP emissaries must have also reached the palaces all over the country. The Kwara State government is believed to have used its VAT revenue from the Federation Account as collateral to borrow N1B in the past week. You win no prize for knowing where the slave owner is taking that.

The cumulative result of all these is that results of the presidential and national election have been written in favour of PDP in many states just as sensitive INEC materials are now in their hands.

Finally, thanks to APGA, Abia State, we now know PDP’s REAL RIGGING PLAN.

We leave the APGA Chairman in Abia State, to regale us with the incredible rigging plot.

“This is the state Chairman of the party, Mr Augustine Ehiemere, as captured while briefing journalists in Umuahia on Sunday, 17 February, 2019.

The plot, he said, would have triggered a chain of violent reactions capable of endangering the lives of innocent people, if it had not been uncovered and halted. According to his Deputy, Onyekwere who  represennted him, the plan was busted on Friday night when police reportedly arrested a man in unlawful possession of election materials which included written result sheets that gave victory to PDP in the aborted Presidential and National Assembly polls. The plot, which involved top government officials, was to have been executed, using men in fake military uniforms. According to Ehiemere, the uniforms would be given to scores of carefully selected, trained and armed thugs, who would impersonate security operatives, while working for PDP. Part of the plot was to also use Toyota Hilux vans, fraudulently branded in army colours, to carry the thugs round the state on the election day.  He alleged that the thugs would intimidate voters and others on legitimate electoral duties as part of the design to disrupt the voting process.

Below is the format to which River State owns the patent: thugs, armed to the teeth would come to a polling unit; shoot sporadically into the air and ask if anyone still wanted to vote. If challenged, they would simply point the nozzle at a few people, shoot one or two fatally and injure a few. Of course, by then, no one would remain in the polling unit. And the security men, being overwhelmed, would simply look on!”

I know for a certainty that one of the reasons NBA does not want the CJN tried is fear of money trails leading straight to some of its members.

“In its statements, pronounce-ments and resolutions, the NBA Leadership has restricted itself to flaying the action of the Executive Branch of Government, mouthing hackneyed phrases about rule of law, due process, independence of the judiciary, separation of powers and adherence to constitutional principles, without paying equal attention to ethical demands in a legal profession that prides itself as honourable …” – The National Association of Democratic Lawyers.

In a fascinating, thematic fashion, the National Association of Democratic Lawyers, this past week, presented a very objective analysis of the ONNOGHEN CONUNDRUM commending, and laying blame, as appropriate, on the various parties that have weighed in on this massive corruption case.

Unfortunately, this article is not an analysis of that timely intervention which I do not have the expertise to attempt.

The article below was already concluded by the time I saw the press release by the NADL.

RULE OF LAW: WHAT RULE OF LAW?

Is it conceivable that the crowd shouting rule of law did not see that photo in which ex-CJN Walter ONNOGHEN was captured, smiling contentedly, in the midst of members of a PDP caucus?  Some say it was taken in Dubai.

If the Nigerian judiciary had not gone to the dogs, would its topmost chieftain, the once almighty Chief Justice of Nigeria, caught with his ten fingers smack in the cookie jar, need any persuasion to gently quit office?

What would Gani Fawehinmi have thought of his professional colleagues, shamelessly rooting for the very chief priest in the Nigerian temple of justice, showing up as nothing more than a decrepit specimen of immorality?

Yes, granted that it did not start today; well aware that we had seen elegantly robed senior lawyers, queuing behind a colleague of theirs while being hauled before the court for the heinous crime of bribing a judge. If that shame was not enough, shouldn’t the instant case of a billionaire CJN be embarrassing enough to bring them back to reality? How far gone in immorality should the Nigerian   judiciary be permitted to descend, and wallow in?

If they could shout process, rule of  law etc , shouldn’t they, for Christ’s sake, give a thought to the very essence of this case – an unmistakable  hawking of court judgments,  or has the practice become so commonplace in our courts that it no longer matters?

For full disclosure, this writer holds many members of the Bar, and the Bench, in great respect, at least individually, which is the reason I am not describing this matter in the lurid language it so richly deserves.

But the question remains: wasn’t this the occasion to have impacted their other members with that well earned dignity that sets them apart? If they are so keen in protecting their profession, what is wrong in first asking the ex-CJN to, first and foremost, resign?

Were they aware this man deliberately postponed a scheduled meeting of the NJC ‘sine die ‘ just so he could hold on to his highly diminished office?

Death, where’s thy sting?

This is when we should have Gani around us live, to teach his misdirected colleagues lessons they’d never forget.

Many lawyers will describe all these as moralising. But do they think Nigerians have thrown morals to the dogs? What is any human being without morals? Or has money taken the place of morals in their life? Has money become their God?

Isn’t there, indeed, a difference between a judge who commits a judicial infraction in the course of adjudicating a case, and the one who does in his capacity as a public servant?

Suppose Justice Onnoghen had, while driving, killed a passerby, are we being told he would first have been referred to the NJC before he could be tried?

This leads one to the totally abhorrent terms of settlement which we are told NBA is negotiating with government. According to a newspaper publication, these are:

CJN to resign or retire without coercion;

Govt to withdraw all charges against Onnoghen;

No molestation of CJN under any guise;

Acting CJN should quit;

NBA team to prevail on relatives, friends to persuade Justice Onnoghen to resign; and consensus on the need to clean up the Judiciary (long term measure) . If any government were chicken-livered enough to accept these terms, what would it have been telling the citizenry?

That it pays to flagrantly flout the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria,

That corruption is right, and pays, but more importantly,

That judges have more than one head and are, therefore, above the laws of the land?

When the Ag CJN is brought into the mix, being queried by the NJC, and NBA says he should go, are they suggesting they would have preferred to see a total breakdown of law and order if Judge Tanko had refused to be sworn in?

There isn’t a scintilla of logic in what the NJC did querying the Ag- CJN. This is one more reason Nigerians believe that the NJC would have sided with ONNOGHEN if government had been remiss enough to have first taken his matter that body as he, recusing himself, would have meant nothing. Government must, therefore, not permit itself to be rushed into any hasty settlement, whatever the sponsored threats from the creeks. The heaven’s falling, is not a one-man problem. Let them go on rampage, destroying critical oil infrastructure, and see how rapidly the Niger Delta will develop.

Isn’t it both illogical, and unreasonable, that while the NBA is arrogantly dictating what it says government must do, Nigerians , in their weird wisdom, must wait for the “family and friends” of Justice  Onnoghen’s to beg him to resign.

Government should treat  this case as the very litmus test of its anti corruption war as it has all the ingredients to make the ex-CJN a good  example of what it is not to ‘forget’ to comply with constitutional provisions.

Inclusive in the case should be money laundering and living above one’s legitimate earnings. The appropriate agencies of government must be requested to conduct a forensic examination into the source of all his funds.  I know for a certainty that one of the reasons NBA does not want the CJN tried is fear of money trails leading straight to some of its members.

President Buhari must give his anti corruption war the needed boost with this case whose successful prosecution could very well reduce corruption in Nigeria by as much as 60 per cent.

“If I may repeat, the Code of Conduct Tribunal has been established with the exclusive jurisdiction to deal with ALL violations contravening any of the provisions of the Code as per paragraph 15(1). This provision has expressly ousted the powers of ordinary regular courts in respect of such violations”. CJN, Mr Justice Walter ONNOGHEN in a Supreme Court ruling on July 12, 2013.

No matter which way you look at it, Chief Justice Onnoghen’s image  is already damaged, damaged far beyond whatever any lawyers’ quibbling, no matter their number or status, can cure. Indeed, not even the courts, whether he shows up  finally, or not, at the Code of Conduct Tribunal can remedy that. This is a matter the Yoruba would, perspicaciously, describe as  isu atayanyan- an ugly looking yam, put simply. Pity in deed.

What, for Christ’s sake was this otherwise decent jurist who, since assuming office, has done so  well, erecting obstacles in the way of those few, but very powerful senior lawyers,  who have elected to be the defence vanguard of the corrupt, defending all manner of sleaze, rather than help Nigeria defeat a monster that has the capacity to destroy  her. I have never stopped, seeing in my inner mind, what a disaster would have befallen  this country had President Jonathan won re election in 2015 and the nation destroyers that populate the PDP become completely  unhinged in their ruinous ways. I have continued to see in that inner mind, a Deziani Madueke, as Petroleum minister, becoming even more brazen, and much more powerful than the President himself, and doing only that which caught her fancy. I continue to see the humongous petro dollars denied the federation account, the eye popping mansions bought all over the world, not forgetting members of  her oil gang buying more yatches that even very rich American musicians could only rent, not buy. Those are the nation destroyers for whom some powerful Nigerian lawyers chose to constitute a defence armada , and against which the redoubtable CJN fought a titanic battle before this.

What a shame?

Lawyers have, understandably, stoutly risen in support of the CJN. Of course, only a fool would not defend a profession that has brought fame, and unspeakable fortune, even though in some cases,  through extreme hard work, unlike those who rush to  television networks as soon as a matter breaks just so they can get a brief. The operating code within the law profession, it seems, is: what touches one, touches all.

It was this thought process that led  to the spectacle of  dozens of SANs, unashamedly, lining behind a colleague who was being arraigned on thoroughly despicable charges for a practicing lawyer.

 I digress.

Back to the CJN’s case then and here I quote the  seminal contribution of  a learned gentleman with almost half a century at the bar.

He wrote: “…the ramifications of what we are dealing with here are enormous and they are certain to be earth shaking. The sacred office has been desecrated. The CJN is mortally wounded but with him many other processes and people. The impact of this daring step intended or not, will have far reaching repercussions on our polity. Should the CJN have ever been caught with his pants down like this? Is this a witch hunt? Were the facts fabricated? Is this high wire politics? Was the CJN using the garb of his exalted office to deliver politically motivated judgments? Should the CJN be above the law? Should exigency be above the law? In spite of the theatrics, this CJN is mortally wounded. He has lost the garb of moral authority. I disagree that this is politically motivated. Even if it was, are the offences true? I have no doubt that for whatever is left of the sanctity of his office the CJN should quit immediately.”

Need I say more after that contribution to what is truly a phenomenon as I captioned this piece?

Yes, of course.

And I go here to the very meat of this matter which the EFCC chose not to emphasise, and lawyers, to the last man, have run away from, instead talking process. What process? What NJC; doesn’t it come into play only when a judge committed a professional misconduct? Suppose this was manslaughter, would  Justice Onnoghen still have been expected  to be referred to the NJC?

Hogwash!

I am talking here of the seedy details of this case and I invite the sundry defenders of the Chief Justice – political opportunists out to defend ethnic interests, e-rats ever so corruption loving and, therefore, forever Buhari-loathing even when he has no hand in this, and PDP looters holding to every straw, aspiring  to claw back into their evil ways, to METICULOUSLY study the little space consideration will permit me to include out  of  this great service to Fatherland by a Non-Governmental Organisation – the Anti-Corruption and Research Based Data Initiative –  in a  document entitled “Petition On Suspected Financial Crimes And Breaches Of The Code Of Conduct Bureau Requirements Against Honourable Mr Justice W.S Nkanu Onnoghen””

After studying it, they should please answer the posers which follow.

“The particulars of our findings indicate that: His Lordship Justice Walter Onnoghen is the owner of sundry accounts primarily funded through cash deposits made by himself, up to as recently as 10th August 2016 which appear to have been run in a manner inconsistent with financial transparency and the code of conduct for public officials. “To give specific examples, here are some instances of cash deposits by Justice Onnoghen: Justice Onnoghen made five different cash deposits of $10,000 each on 8th March 2011 into Standard Chartered Bank Account …; “On 7th June 2011, two separate cash deposits of $5000 each were made by Justice Walter Onnoghen, followed by four cash deposits of $10,000 each; “On 27th June 2011, Justice Onnoghen made another set of five separate cash deposits of $10,000 each and made four more cash deposits of $10,000 each on the following day, 28th June 2011; “Hon. Justice Walter Onnoghen did not declare his assets immediately after taking office, contrary to Section 15 (1) of Code of Conduct Bureau and Tribunal Act; “Hon. Justice Walter Onnoghen did not comply with the constitutional requirement for public servants to declare their assets every four years during their career; “The Code of Conduct Bureau Forms (Form CCB 1) of Hon. Justice Walter Onnoghen for 2014 and 2016 were dated and filed on the same day. The acknowledgement slip for Declarant SCN: 000014 was issued on 14th December 2016. The acknowledgement slip for Declarant SCN: 000015 was also issued on 14th December 2016, at which point Justice Onnoghen had become the Chief Justice of Nigeria. “The affidavit for SCN: 000014 was sworn to on 14th December 2016; The affidavit for SCN: 000015 was sworn to on 14th December 2016; “Both forms were received on 14th December 2016 by one Awwal Usman Yakasai. “The discrepancy between Justice Walter Onnoghen’s two CCB forms that were filed on the same day is significant. “In filling the section on Details of Assets, particularly Cash, in Nigerian Banks, His Lordship as Declarant SCN: 000014 mentioned only two bank accounts: “Union Bank account number in Abuja, with balance of N9,536,407, as at 14th November 2014. “Union Bank account number in Calabar, with balance of N11, 456,311 as at 14th November 2014. “The sources of the funds in these accounts are stated as salaries, estacodes and allowances. “

On and on it went ad infinitum.

So to these defenders of faith, which of these is professional judicial misconduct which should lead to the CJN being referred to the NJC? Now suppose this is political witch-hunt, as they claim, didn’t the same witch hunt remove Mrs Kemi Adeosun and Babachir Lawal from their high offices as  Beridam Ben from Port Harcourt asked?

Now what is the composition of the NJC some peole are dying to have the Hon Mr Justice Onnoghen referred? I quote Beridam Ben again: “NJC has 24 members, 4 of them statutory and 5 are appointed by the CJ, meaning Justice Onnoghen, on NBA recommendation. Of the remaining 15, including  the CJ and representing 62.5 % of the membership, are 11 persons the CJ selected and  In deed, says Ben jocularly, 2 of them could very well be his younger siblings as they are non lawyers he believes are of “unquestionable character”.

Is that the body some funny people want the CJ referred, in Nigeria, not in Britain or America?

And, finally, what has His Lordship been selling: oproko, palm oil or rice?

Enough of these shenanigans. The CJN should honourably walk away.