The Nation Newspaper

Category: Sunday

Palladium versus the AGF: must ‘theory’ pit respect for the rule of law against justice for a looted and deeply wronged nation and its peoples?
What both the president and Mr. Malami are doing to the judiciary is even more damaging than the corruption they conclude has hobbled justice delivery.
•Idowu Akinlotan, The Nation, Sunday, January 24, 2016.

It is only a person who does not read his column, “Palladium”, regularly that will accuse Idowu Akinlotan of willfully and perversely placing respect for the rule of law above justice for Nigeria and Nigerians in the current war that the Buhari administration is waging in our law courts against corruption. But having made this cautionary observation, I must add that anyone who has been reading Akinlotan’s column in the last three weeks without a prior familiarity with his formidable and impeccable credentials as a patriot and a radical democrat can be forgiven if he or she comes to the conclusion that it matters far more to Akinlotan that the formal principles and protocols of the rule of law be observed than that those who have been accused of looting the nation be brought to justice and restitution be made to the looted and the wronged nation and its citizens. Definitely, I have been utterly taken aback by thestrident tone of Akinlotan’s tirades against what he has called jungle justice and lynch mobs in his column in the last three weeks, week after week.

This perturbing trend rose to a climax, indeed a crescendo in last week’s “Palladium” column that was revealingly titled “Abubakar Malami’s inquisitorial tendency”. Dear reader, please consider the postulate that Akinlotan makes in the sentence that serves as the epigraph to this piece, this being a quotation from last week’s “Palladium” essay: “What both the president and Mr. Malami are doing to the judiciary is even more damaging to the judiciary than the corruption they conclude has hobbled justice delivery”. By what logic, by what demonstrably civic-minded and good-intentioned reasoning can such a claim be made? I suggest that Akinlotan in fact gives us something that does look like a rationale, a ‘theory’ in the light of which his allegation that Buhari and the AGF are doing worse damage to the Nigerian judiciary than the monumental impunity of corruption in the judiciary itself can be accepted. However, the problem is that this ‘theory’ is itself highly tendentious in the manner in which it pits respect for the rule of law far above the universal demand for justice in our country at the present time.

Now, it is of course true that many columnists and pundits beside Akinlotan have declared,publicly and extensively, that both Buhari and his Attorney General, Mr. Malami, have come pretty close to arrogant disregard for the rule of law in the willful manner in which they have deliberately disobeyed court orders granting bail to some of the accused in the ongoing trials concerning the alleged stealing of funds intended forprocurement of arms in the fight against the Boko Haram insurgents. Indeed, many prominent members of the Bar who are known to be uncompromising in their dedication to the cause of justice for the nation and its citizens in the ongoing legal battles against corruption have called on Buhari to obey the law courts in the matter of the bails granted to Dasuki and his cohort of co-accused litigants. But this is not the location of Akinlotan’s savage quarrel with Buhari and his AGF. Beyond this obvious terrain of arrant disregard of the rulings of the law courts, Akinlotan thinks that the president and the AGF not only do not have an adequate grasp of the full ramifications of the political economy of corruption in our country, they also quite dangerously regard the judiciary as an extension of the executive to be ordered or kicked around in the war against corruption. Against this profile – which, I hasten to add, can hardly be faulted – Akinlotan makes some ringing, clamant declarations: that the judiciary is not an extension of the executive; that in a properly functioning democracy the independence of the judiciary must only be respected but must be adequately funded and institutionally protected; and that none of the three arms of government – executive, legislative and judicial – has a claim to moral probity that entitles it to act as the tribune, the arbiter of values to the other arms of government. For this particular reason, Akinlotan argues passionately that a disproportionate burden of responsibility is being placed on the judiciary for the vast scale and impunity of corruption in Nigeria. And most significantly of all, in a manner rather reminiscent of the Spanish philosopher, Ortega y Gasset’s haughty liberal anti-populism in his celebrated book, The Revolt of the Masses,Akinlotan thinks that not only is the Nigerian public starkly ignorant of these subtler dimensions of the phenomenon of corruption in our country, Buhari and his AGF are deliberately exploiting this ignorance of the masses in the manner in which they are waging the war against corruption in the law courts.

These are unpalatable facts and it is hard not to agree with some of the inferences, if not the conclusions, that Akinlotan draws from them. For instance, it is incontestable that Buhari and his AGF were so unprepared for the granting of bails to Dasuki and the other accused persons that so far they have seen no other way out of the problem than to simply disobey the courts. As I have pointed out in a previous essay in this column, the Buhari administration had strategic and tactical options other than the prevailing status quo in the administration of criminal justice in Nigeria in the legal battle against corruption but they chose to stick with the status quo which notoriously andexorbitantly favours looters and their lawyers.This situation is so astounding that one is left with no other conclusion than tactics and strategy being so absent in the administration’s war on corruption in the law courts, no ‘theory’, no overarching set of values drives Buhari’s war on corruption. In other words, the prosecution of the war is completely subsumed by its declaration; anything that stands in the way of the prosecution amounts to opposition to the declaration. The intellectual bankruptcy of this aspect of the president’s battle against corruption in our law courts is incalculable.

Unfortunately, Akinlotan is also right on aspects of the Nigerian public’s perception of the war on corruption. Buhari has risen immensely in stature just on account of the dizzying number and scope of disclosures of looting and looters, even as other aspects of his “change” slogan and program have either come unstuck or are extremely slow in their execution. Indeed, many of the president’s supporters have declared, against the evidence, that the war on corruption is on course, Lai Mohammed, the Federal Minister of Information, being the most vociferous of such people. Quite possibly, the president is intuitively placing high value on the cathartic impact of the disclosures: even before and beyond actual recovery of stolen loot in billions of dollars and trillions of naira, the parade of looters, some of them in handcuffs, digs deep into powerful emotions of symbolic revenge that shaming rituals evoke in the collective mind.Speaking only for myself, I remain completely unimpressed by the disclosures since the looters were always hiding in plain sight and all it took to get at them was a change of ruling party at the center. I shall applaud if and only when the new ruling party wages the war on corruption in a manner that shows clearly that we have arrived at a stage in the moral progress of this country in which it will be next to impossible for corruption in high places to go unpunished.

The preceding point leads directly to the heart of my quarrel with Akinlotan’s ‘theory’ whose principal error or defect lies in the fact that it is completely blind to its own interpretive or analytical limitations.The most startling of these limitations – and the only one that I will engage in this article – is Akinlotan’s extreme formalism. In pure formal or ideational terms, Akinlotan is quite right to insist that all the three arms of government are deeply tainted by corruption and none of them can presume to act as guide or arbiter to the others. But this entirely misses the fact that in the real world of corruption in Nigeria, more than the other arms of government, the judiciary has perfected the art of hiding its corruption behind the shield of the abstract principle of the rule of law. In plain language, a judge who has received hefty bribes which makes him grant bail to a looter can impose heavy fines and strictures against a political officeholder that disobeys his ruling, this purely on the basis of the abstract, formal principle of respect for the rule of law. It so happens that everyone knows that this happens routinely and persistently in the Nigerian judicial system, yet no one has stopped invoking the rule of law as the determinant of justice in the last instance, even if, as everyone knows, justice happens very, very rarely in the Nigerian judiciary.

What I find most disturbing of all in Akinlotan’s ‘theory’ is the utter indifference to the revolutionary possibilities of the popular demand for justice by Nigerians in their tens of millions in their support of Buhari’s declared war against corruption. All Akinlotan can see is, apparently, the unawareness of the masses, their ‘ignorance’ if you wish, of the subtler aspects of the political economy of corruption in our country. But what of their demand that the looting should stop and that the recovered loot be used to finance programs that alleviate the hardship and suffering of the masses? What of consideration of how this popular demand can in fact be used to initiate deeper structural redistribution of wealth in our country? Must this demand wait until much needed reforms in the Nigerian judicial order have been undertaken? And can such reforms come only from above, without the active support of the masses? These and similar questions will serve as our point of resumption of the discussion in next week’s concluding essay in this series.
- Biodun Jeyifo bjeyifo@fas.harvard.edu
January 31, 2016
Of truth-sayers and gain-sayers

I had hoped that realization would dawn on the National Assembly to the crazed state of the economy, and sanity would prevail. What the assembly wants to do, however, is a sign of the failure of sanity.

I would have said that ex-president Olusegun Obasanjo is a great letter writer but for the little fact that he is yet to write to me. I guess though that he would not because, as you may have noticed, he writes mainly to accuse. He wrote Abacha when that one was head of state. Was it a love letter now, I can’t remember. But I don’t think there was any love lost between the two of them, what with one of them’s back being used as an ironing board and all, so it could hardly have been rrrrrove!

I can’t remember now if he wrote Yar’adua but he certainly wrote Jonathan, more than once. Were those letters dripping with love or hate now? Oh dear, this porous brain of mine is a real let-down these days because I have trouble remembering the trail of my thoughts. So, what were we talking about again? Oh yes, Obj.’s penchant for letter writing. Yeah, you could say his pen was so very busy he looked for people to write to. How on earth he has consistently missed my name among the privileged ones to receive his missives is not clear to me. You think maybe it has something to do with my name? I could change it…

Anyway, Nigeria’s national assembly are currently on the hit list of those at the receiving end of Obj.’s love letters. The lucky devils, eh? Oh yes, they are love letters; you know, the kind that says ‘It is because I love you that I am telling you the truth about yourself – you’re selfish, rude and stupid!’ Thank God for love!

So, Obj. the truth-sayer wrote to the assembly and told them a few home truths about themselves (which they did not know before) and about the nation (which they knew already). He told the senators and Representatives that they are greedy, selfish … but you already know the rest (i.e., the contents of the letter).

I don’t want to appraise the contents of the letter here. I believe that there are others who can do that infinitely better than I can mainly because they are more intelligent, savvy and can sling insults and praise better than me. I intend to confine myself to just a few tasks here. First, I want to praise Caesar, then I want to bury Caesar, then I want to try Caesar for carrying stories.

First, let me tell you about Caesar. That man had great power as the Consul of the Roman Republic, just like our Obj., though not in Rome. Actually, you are free to substitute Obj.’s name as we go along if you like, because, like Obj., he was a general and a penner of prose. Look at that, so many similarities. Anyway, insofar as he could set all records straight, especially the records of his beliefs, thoughts and campaigns, he was indeed praiseworthy.

In a similar way, Obj. has tried to set the records straight for us by drawing attention to the hearts of the assembly members. What he said in effect is that their hearts are not in the right place as far as the nation is concerned. They are, said he, spending more than the nation is earning. They are, further said he more or less, heartless in refusing to align themselves with the nation’s dire straits. Did he say it well? I heard this morning on radio that even his erstwhile gainsayer (someone who says, ‘I object!’ to everyone’s embarrassed hearing) nodded his head and said, ‘Well said, very well said indeed’. He said that. Twice I heard it. Let’s move on, oink, oink.

While Caesar can be said to be truly dead and buried, thankfully Obj. is not. So the comparison breaks down there. However, let us see what we want to bury in the man. Truly, I don’t know much about the man Obj. but I hear he tells people the truth about themselves, out of love. I hear he looks people in the eye and tells them they are selfish, rude and stupid; a real truth-sayer, that one.

So, it appears the nation was not quite surprised when he told the truth about the National Assembly. Now, do we want to bury that truth-saying aspect of him? I guess not. I guess we want more truth-sayers in the land. Indeed, if there were more of them, my guess is that we’d be in less murky waters than we are in right now. And we are in such murky waters it looks like we are in some quick-sinking quicksand (stop objecting; this is no time to get technical). We hardly have any money to eat as a nation; people are earning less than fifty dollars a month and here are their honourable selves planning on buying new cars for oversight functions, some say even planning to buy new cars for each member, and some even going further to say even paying themselves higher than they are supposed to. Seriously?!!

In response, I assure you, some among the assembly have tried Obj. on their own. They have weighed him in the balance and have found him altogether wanting. They stated indeed that Obj. was trying to ‘distract’ them. This is curious, you’ll agree, because I asked, distract them from what exactly and how? Well, as usual, I’m full of more questions than answers. They accused him of being mistaken in the identity of those to receive his missive this time. Then, they accused him of trying to divert attention away from any investigation into some of the scandals of his own time. I don’t know if they are truth-sayers here or gainsayers; but they have not given any cogent reasons for the proposed expenditure.

Truth here is, I’m the one putting someone on trial and it’s someone else flinging out the charges. As for me, my own accusation is this: why did Obj. not see to the completion of the Oyo-Ogbomoso new express road before he left office? Why, oh why? Since he would not write to me, I have promised myself that I would one day write my own missive to ask him this.

In the meantime, many, I understand, have been calling for the heads of the assemblymen. Since these men (and women too) have represented mainly a drain in the purse of the nation, many people have reasoned, and since very few really understand their duties, let us do away with them altogether, they have cried.

While I am as grieved as anyone that the nation’s representative assembly could plan to go on this kind of spending spree when the nation is going a-borrowing to finance its budget, I am really reluctant to join my voice with the ‘off-with-their-heads’ group. This is not Alice in Wonderland. Though I had long since been afraid it would come to this, I had hoped that realization would dawn on the assembly to the crazed state of the economy, and sanity would prevail. What the assembly wants to do, however, is a sign of the failure of sanity. In the assembly then, reason seems to be on vacation.

But reason must come back. There are many states, dear Senators and Honourables, where many, many workers have not received salaries for months. Unfortunately, the workers have not been the only ones carrying this cross. Listen, just this afternoon, someone peddling a tray of bananas was grumbling to my hearing that since salaries stopped being paid, she had stopped having good sales. She said she was on the verge of folding up her banana business. She was therefore praying that workers would be paid soon so that she could have good sales again. In this situation, dear truth-sayers and gainsayers, please let us be reasonable about this proposed expenditure.

January 31, 2016
Kogi makes wrong history

Less than two weeks ago, Kogi State bit the wrong bullet when, with the help of the electoral body and other political titans, they prepared to inaugurate Yahaya Bello as the governor. Apparently, this was child’s play. On inauguration day, Kogites exceeded themselves when they achieved the undistinguished honour of making the wrong history. On January 27, Alhaji Bello became the first Nigerian and the first governor to be sworn in without a deputy. It was an inevitable culmination of serial lawlessness never before seen or experienced in these parts, a corruption so insidious and far worse than the embezzlement of a trillion naira, that it beggars belief it can find accommodation anywhere in government.

In the supplementary election of December 5, 2015, Alhaji Bello also made history when, with the help of shadowy presidency officials and the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), he became the first governorship candidate to run for office without a running mate. The constitution opposed it, and nothing in the Electoral Act supported that strange and crazy move, but neither the meddlesome Attorney General of the Federation, Abubakar Malami, nor the brilliant minds at INEC frowned at the insurrection against the law. It was an expediency they could tolerate, nay, even accommodate, and apparently, help to sustain.

But Kogi State was not done making history. To the state, if it would make history, it had better be one that would not be rivalled for centuries to come. Alhaji Bello ran for office without a running mate, won, in the eyes of INEC, without a running mate, and was inaugurated without a deputy governor. Had the tomfoolery stopped there, perhaps all would not be lost. Instead, the inauguration itself achieved a series of firsts. None of the powerful men in the All Progressives Congress (APC) in Abuja and in government who knew about the constitutional subversion that took place in the state had the courage to attend the inauguration. Their consciences suddenly came to life, and they recognised the danger of being tarred with the disgrace and criminality of that electoral insurrection. The story of the plotters will be told one day, for they are not as shadowy as some think.

On Kogi’s governorship inauguration day only two governors attended and, with as much sombreness as they could manage, gave bland speeches enjoining Kogites to help Alhaji Bello make a success of his tenure. The two governors of Benue and Nasarawa attended the inauguration because they are Kogi’s neighbours. They showed no enthusiasm, and they said nothing stirring. Who knows what was agitating their minds? The two governors were as far as Alhaji Bello could go in attracting dignitaries to his inauguration. President Muhammadu Buhari was not there, however, and shockingly did not send a representative, though he is party leader of the APC that won the Kogi poll. He had refused to campaign for his party when the late Abubakar Audu, a Rabiu Kwankwaso acolyte, was candidate of the APC. Even after the victory, the president would still refuse to attend. Why?

Vice President Yemi Osinbajo was also absent at the inauguration. He had campaigned for Prince Audu, but was generally silent in the dangerous and convoluted aftermath of the death of the APC candidate, when all hell in plotting was let loose upon the beleaguered and fragile state. Professor Osinbajo is a lawyer, and he knows what the law and the constitution say, and he has given indication he has a conscience he would neither sell nor allow anyone to price. He also did not send a representative. It is a sad day not only for Kogi, but for Nigeria, when the number one and number two citizens would boycott such a significant occasion involving their party’s victory and celebration, and would not even send representatives.

Alas, Kogi was still not done making history. Both the Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and the Speaker of the House of Representatives, Yakubu Dogara, who are leading members of the APC, also avoided the event like a plague. They knew in their hearts that both the election of Alhaji Bello and his inauguration without a deputy were a mindless corruption of the laws and the constitution. Irrespective of where they stood in the fray privately, they knew, as men who lead others to make laws for the country, that it would be foolish to openly identify with the perversion that took place on January 27. Indeed the only notable representation that took place on that day was the announcement that the wife of the Nasarawa State governor represented the wife of the president. Mrs Almakura did not make that announcement herself, and this column could not independently verify the supposed claim of representation. Other than this unverified representation, there was nothing of significance worth remembering in terms of attendance. There was no presidency official, no federal cabinet member, no top national lawmaker, no charismatic governor anywhere other than those that duty and geography compelled to attend, and no man of means, of intellect and of character. Notwithstanding the small noise here and there in the stadium, the event could pass for a funeral, perhaps a fairly well-attended funeral.

If all the people who plotted the so-called change in Kogi did not have the courage to attend, but left the unassertive chairman of the party, Odigie Oyegun, to carry the can and manage the obsequies, what other thing of significance took place at the inauguration? Plenty. Senator Dino Melaye, who virtually took over the master of ceremony job from the two persons assigned that responsibility, indulged his customary buffoonery to the hilt again. He is loud, obtruding, voluble and syncretistic. He did not disappoint in demonstrating his unmitigated coarseness. It is a mystery how such an offensive man moved in the circles of APC leadership, not to talk of being elected, or imposed himself, as senator. For Senator Melaye, everything was reduced to hilarity, and as far as his infantile mind was concerned, the constitutional subversion that produced Alhaji Bello and the mockery of the law that saw him inaugurated as governor without a deputy were the handiwork of God. While the plotters and other invited dignitaries discretely stayed away from the inauguration, Senator Melaye saw the occasion as an opportunity to showcase his eloquence and celebrate his lack of character.

Then there is of course the 41-year-old governor himself, a man who prides himself on his youthful age and on the opportunism that gave him the unmerited office of governor. It was bad enough that his inauguration address lacked grace, finesse, sense and power; it was worse that he struggled to read his own speech with any sense of coherence and modest expertise. He tripped over the words, appeared frequently disconcerted, and dared not look up from the papers in front of him. What ailed him? His tormented conscience, knowing he was occupying a stolen office, or his lack of familiarity with the written word, even for a graduate of accounting and business administration? The only thing applauded in the governor’s mediocre speech was when he quoted President Buhari’s “I belong to everybody, and I belong to nobody” adaptation of the late politician Sunday Awoniyi’s speech. The stadium was otherwise generally quiet, at least not inspired into whoops of joy or ecstasy by either the governor’s sheer presence or his speech. Everyone, including the governor, knows that the whole contraption will not last. It is a charade and a corruption of the electoral process.

It is remarkable that few top Nigerians, distinguished legal minds, and opinion moulders, have said anything about the terrible constitutional affront that took place in Kogi in the last two months. Perhaps they see the crisis as internal to the APC, and one involving a faction fighting another. They are wrong and short-sighted. What is even worse is the fact that top APC leaders could lend their weight to the electoral and constitutional perversion engineered by, and in, their party. How they do not see that the injustice enacted in their party would still haunt them in the future, possibly destroy their party, or even trigger far-reaching implications that could doom democracy, is hard to understand. APC leaders may not see the dangers ahead, but without a shred of doubt, the Kogi crisis will not end until justice has been done. They should pray that the courts, which are being battered everywhere by the people and the government, should put an end to the political, ethnic and sectarian rascality going on in Kogi. The alternative is too grim to contemplate, both for the APC which will never be the same again because of the demons it has unleashed, and the country which has lacked the patriots and men of courage and principle to embrace and nurture what is right and lawful.

January 31, 2016
Okon takes over Wadata Plaza

And so the seconds tick for Secondus. In the week that The Economist magazine of London famously dismissed Goodluck Jonathan as an “ineffectual buffoon”, (Phew!!!) you would have thought that there ought to be a let up in the cosmic buffoonery that has overtaken the former ruling party. But farce and Rabelaisian horse-play seem to have become the staple fare of the biggest power rally in Africa. Vultures are fighting dirty over the bloated carcass.

At the last count, more than three pretenders including a former Jonathan journeyman portentously named Gulak (sans Archipelago) have staked their claim. Secondus the First appears to have been seconded to political Siberia. It is power play in the time of political cholera, or is it political lassa? But it is said that if you don’t bury a dead person because he has no relations, you will have to bury him because of the foul stench and the public health hazard.

As snooper was ruminating over the plight of a party that once shook Nigeria to its foundation but which has now become the butt of hilarious jokes and savage derision, a decrepit lorry pulled up right in front of the house. Out jumped Okon dressed like a resource control robber-baron together with several stalwarts and the inevitable Baba Lekki uproariously and leglessly drunk as usual.

They were all calling Okon chairman and hailing his bravery and native sagacity to high heavens. Before you could say Jack Robinson, the men had started offloading cutlasses, cudgels and all manner of dangerous charms: Onde, Ikunpa, gbetu-gbetu, Ayeta. Isiju,kanako, Gbabi-magbabe, Balu-balu, Gbekude etc. Oh Lord, has it come to this in this country, snooper wondered.

“Okon, what is the meaning of all this?” snooper demanded in alarm.

“Ha oga, gbegede don catch fire, as dem Baba Sikira dey say for Epe Yoruba. I don overtake dem PDP chairman,” the mad boy chortled triumphantly. “We no go gree make dem mala people overtake dem party by cunny cunny. As dem no want Secondus, dem don get Okon.”

“I second!” Baba Lekki concurred with drunken relish. One of the men began snaggling and snapping at snooper like a demented hunter’s dog.

“And who is this man?” snooper asked in alarm as the Rottweiler made to charge at him.

“Ha dat one na Agbako Olisa. Na my own Metuh be dat. Na him go bite dem finis and if dem conduct yeye election na him go tear and whack dem paper.” The mad boy retorted.

“I see, so where is your manifesto?” snooper demanded, trying to suppress his mirth and amusement.

“Oga plane don crash and you dey ask for manifest, which kind manifest be dat?” the crazy boy retorted.

“Mr man, stop asking foolish questions. Chairman no dey read paper”, one man screamed and heaved forward like a menacing hooligan.

“Who is this man?” snooper shouted as the thug began shadow wrestling.

“Ha oga dis one na Professor Pakaleke. Him head no correct at all. Make him no come wire you well well. Na him kill dem Ibadan masquerade”, Okon cautioned.

On that perilous note snooper quickly back-heeled into the house and bolted the door.

January 31, 2016
Lai Mohammed takes umbrage, shocks the public

The standard reply to every critic of the Buhari presidency’s method of fighting corruption is that corruption is fighting back. The Minister of Information, Lai Mohammed, reiterated this fact last week when he took on the critics, describing them as blackmailers, hack writers, sophists, and sponsored corruption orchestra. In plain language, there can be no criticism of their methods, and anyone who offers one is either corrupt or has been hired by corrupt people to fight their dirty war. The same anomalous understanding of what it means to run a pluralist society is found among supporters of the government who naively equate dissent from those questionable methods as in fact support for corruption as a whole. If you are not for them, take note, you are against them, for there can be no middle ground.

But who is blackmailing whom? Those who say the constitution and the laws of the land have dictated, indeed circumscribed, how the war should be fought? Or those who insist the weight of the financial crimes is so heavy that that in itself legitimises every means, orthodox or not, moral or invidious, in fighting it. Is it those who warn that the laws could not be subverted without doing damage to the body politic, and thus setting dangerous precedents; or those who insist that if extraordinary means were not used, there would be no society to administer with elegant, so-called sacrosanct laws? It is this kind of dangerous dualism encased in hysteria that hallmarks military regimes, ruins civilizations, creates an atmosphere of repression and intolerance, and diminishes the person and humanity of the citizen.

It is also a clever manipulation of the anti-corruption narrative. In the opinion of the Buhari presidency, as emphasised by Alhaji Mohammed, you could not oppose their methods without being in support of corruption. This column has no patience with that sort of vile argument. There is no law anywhere in the world that is perfect; they are constantly being improved, as criminals exploit loopholes in them. But until the law is tightened through legitimate amendments, no one, not the presidency, and no crime, not even murder, must be used as reason to flout the constitution. On this, there can be no meeting point between this column and the Information minister, nor with the fainthearted who perch on the fence, afraid to be cast as pro-corruption. The laws, even as they are at the moment, can knock corruption into a cocked hat. But they can be made better, more brutally efficient, and more discouraging to criminals.

Hear the Information minister: “Well, I can tell you today that corruption is already fighting back, and it is fighting hard and dirty. Sponsored articles have started appearing in the newspapers and in the social media while ‘Talking Heads’ have started making the rounds in the electronic media, all deriding the fight against corruption as well as this Administration. Not stopping there, they have been creating distractions by sponsoring articles in both local and international media to deride the administration’s policies generally, tag the President a budding dictator and even write off his 2016 budget. We know that the sole purpose of these attacks is to distract attention from the war on corruption.

“It is saddening that some otherwise credible voices have unwittingly allowed themselves to be railroaded into the bandwagon of pro-corruption orchestra. They engage in sophistry to try to rally Nigerians against the anti-corruption battle…

“This Administration will neither be distracted nor intimidated by anyone into abandoning or weakening the fight against corruption, which is a war of survival for our nation. No amount of media or other attacks will stop the fight. The pseudo-analysts and hack writers will labour in vain in their quest to stop the train of this anti-corruption fight…What are we even talking about? Is the human rights of the 55 persons more important than human rights of 170 million Nigerians? But again, let me make it clear that we do not disobey court orders”.

It is not clear how the Information minister, himself a lawyer, could draw a distinction between the rights of even one person and that of the rest of Nigeria. But he did. Worse, without offering proof, he is saying very clearly that every critic of how the anti-graft war is being prosecuted has been bought. When the critics put their lives and money on the line to support the APC and the Buhari candidature last year, were they bought by the APC? When they fought Goodluck Jonathan, were they directed by the APC? Alhaji Mohammed must stop his propagandist approach to defending the government in such a manner that Dr Jonathan would begin to look like the better democrat. He insults writers, and demeans them. It will be a poor country indeed when and where everyone heads in one direction, bowled over by the government’s methods and policies, whether those methods are right or wrong.

The Information minister must understand that fighting corruption is a noble and necessary task. But to prevent impunity and excesses, the laws of the land have indicated how that war must be waged. What the public wants to hear is the government’s proof that it has kept to the ambit of the law, not unsubstantiated accusations about whose conscience has been bought or sold, and certainly not scary figures deployed and interpreted to whip the public into lynch mob readiness. Imagine if the Jonathan government had equated APC’s criticism of how the anti-terror war was being fought in 2014 with support for terrorists. The Buhari presidency is not infallible. If he does not have people around him to restrain him, as many now fear, critics will do the job, even at the risk of being stigmatised.

January 31, 2016
The dishonourable art of not ever resigning

A propos of the subject of the alienation of the post-colonial subject, one must observe that one of the reasons for the massive institutional failure in post-colonial Africa is the dishonorable art of not ever resigning. Nobody ever resigns honorably in these climes. Why is it that Africans cling to office long after they have disgraced themselves in the selfsame office? Yet honorable resignation matters for the institutionalization of public honour. It shows that principles transcend principals.

This column once published a piece titled “The honorable art of resignation”. It urged those who felt personally betrayed by the Jonathan administration to take a honorable bow and exit. There were no takers. Not even those who claim to be the blue-eyed boys and girls of the Bretton Wood institutions. They loitered around until their reputation became thoroughly besmirched in the gargantuan cesspool of corruption and sleaze.

There are still many of them loitering around the corridor of the Buhari administration long after they have disgraced themselves and their profession by their unworthy and unprofessional conduct. These grim careerists and shabby charlatans abound in parastatals, commissions, government-owned media organizations, particularly the so called NTA, and even university councils. If President Buhari’s withering stare of contempt does not faze them, neither will his stony frown of disapprobation.

In civilized climes, nobody would have told them to hand in their resignation. They would have jumped before being pushed. They are a disgrace to their family and profession and a crying shame to the kind of Nigeria many who voted in the historic presidential election are hoping to see in their life time. But there ought to be a limit to self-abasement in the pursuit of the next meal.

These people constitute a menace and hazard to public health and morality. Since they will not fall on their broken swords, Buhari should direct that they should be weeded out without any further procrastination. This is the only way we can begin to lay a new foundation for public rectitude and the institutionalization of public honour and principles so crucial to modern governance.

January 31, 2016
LUTH Diary: Let us pray

This piece will be the last in my three-part series on my two-week admission at the Lagos University Teaching Hospital (LUTH).

I thank those who have called, congratulating me for surviving the sickness that could have added me to the list of many who have died after ‘ a brief illness’.

I remain ever grateful to God for divine healing and taking control of a number of instances during my admission, when even the medical personnel were not too sure of what to do.

I still remember the drama that played out the day I was discharged.

A team of doctors arrived my bedside and for almost twenty minutes, they reviewed my case but couldn’t agree whether to discharge me or ask that I undergo some more tests.

A senior Consultant passing by to see another patient had to be asked for his opinion. Based on my test results, he said I had no business remaining on the hospital bed and should be discharged.

Shortly after arriving the hospital, I was asked to go for dialysis. While waiting to find the right place for the treatment since the service was not available in the hospital, two other medical personnel that attended to me said I should put it on hold.

Eventually, it was resolved that I went for three sessions of dialysis. Thankfully, the diagnostic centre I went to was efficiently run, and based on the results, the doctors concluded that just one session was enough.

Considering the critical health conditions of most of the patients on admission at LUTH, one would have expected that the necessary facilities for any kind of test and service would be available at the top rate institution. Unfortunately, that was not the case.

The diagnostic centre I went to was in Oshodi, some kilometres from LUTH and anything could have happened on our way to and from the centre that could have complicated my condition. My wife almost got duped at a laboratory around LUTH, which did not have the capacity to conduct a test I was required to do.

Getting the right treatment does not only depend on doctors, but also on getting the right test to properly diagnose every ailment. One of my test results from one of the most reliable recommended private laboratories turned out to be misleading. The doctor asked for a repeat and his doubt was confirmed when the new test result reverted to the trend before the wrong one.

One of my test results went missing at the test centre in the hospital and it was later discovered to have been wrongly filed midway into conducting another one. A nurse told me how she was once given another person’s test result and she rejected it because she knew her case was not as critical as reflected by the result she was given.

So what has prayers got to do with all the instances listed above? My son who ran most of the errands during my stay in the hospital was so alarmed by not only the critical conditions of the patients, but the dire implication of errors in the various medical procedures that he said, more than ever before, he now knows what to pray for about patients on admission.

Prayers for hospital patients and doctors have since become top on my prayer list.

Not only do I pray for divine healing for the patients since the best doctors themselves admit all they can do is care, I usually remember to pray for wisdom, knowledge and understanding about every medical condition for doctors.

I also pray against wrong diagnosis that can mislead doctors, and for patience and strength for nurses to cope with the many patients they have to attend to.

January 31, 2016
Matters arising

Still on taxation, Obasanjo’s letter and transparency in the National Assembly

Three developments in the past week in a sense lent credence to my position on this page last Sunday that what Nigerians need to get out of the woods is not taxation. Asking Nigerians to pay more taxes now cannot be called creativity, especially since we had already travelled in the past the way of some of the taxes. As a matter of fact, we are still paying some of the taxes which some people want increased. Our problem is beyond that, and that much is evident in the mindboggling revelations on the $2.1bilion Dasukigate. As I said last week, this is only a tip of the iceberg because we are still going to witness even more damning revelations when the searchlight is beamed on the oil sector with its odious stench.

The first development was the presentation of two bills by President Muhammadu Buhari to the National Assembly seeking to facilitate the war against money laundering. The bills are: “The Money Laundering (Prevention and Prohibition) Bill, 2016” and “The Mutual Legal Assistance in Criminal Matters Bill, 2016.” The letter to which the bills were attached was read by Senate President, Bukola Saraki, and House of Representatives Speaker, Yakubu Dogara, to legislators during the assembly’s plenary session on January 27.

The first bill seeks to repeal the existing Money Laundering Act to allow for stronger punishments against money launderers while the second will make provisions that will enable Nigeria seek international assistance in recovering looted funds.

The other development was former President Olusegun Obasanjo’s letter to the National Assembly on the obvious opaqueness of their spending, the N4.7billion cars they want to purchase, ostensibly for committee work, and sundry matters bothering on insensitivity and corruption.

The third development was the announcement by the Federal Government that it does not intend to increase taxes. Coming barely five days after I had vehemently opposed further tax burden on Nigerians, these developments were such sweet music to my ears. Minister of Budget and National Planning, Senator Udo Udoma, said after a meeting of the National Economic Council (NEC) that “Government will not impose additional taxes on individual and corporate bodies to avoid additional burden on Nigerians”. This shows the government already knows that the people are going through hell and would not want to compound their woes. This is compassion at work and it is the kind of soothing balm that Nigerians need in these trying moments, not harsh words like they ‘MUST’ pay. The government does not have to be a tax master to meet its budgetary obligations.

Anyway, whilst Senate President Saraki’s reply to Obasanjo was somewhat courteous and understandable, Senator Dino Melaye launched into how Obasanjo bribed the then National Assembly over his third term ambition. I am not an Obasanjo fan and those familiar with my column know that much. But the fact is that as much as possible, we should always try to separate the message from the messenger. Obasanjo’s message in this instance is clear: the senators should reconsider their decision to buy 120 exotic cars at N4.7billion for committee work in view of the economic situation in the country. Senator Melaye simply failed to address that issue. Some other senators say Obasanjo wrote the letter to cause disaffection between them and the president.

Pray, how does that also address the issue? Chief Obasanjo we all know. But, whether you like or hate him is not important. What is important is to realise that a bad child sometimes has his good days. Today, he is wrong; tomorrow he is right. You can even say, like Azu Ishiekwene once said, that whatever he did right was a mistake. May be his letter this time around was one of such mistakes; but he was right all the same. What Senator Melaye and the rest should tell us is whether Obasanjo made sense or not by telling the law makers to save the country the N4.7billion for cars, and make their spending transparent instead of wasting time telling us things we already know. Nigerians must be wary of this divide-and-rule tactic by our political elite. When they wanted to sweep former President Goodluck Jonathan out of power, many of them made Obasanjo’s home a Mecca of sort. It was convenient for them to forget then that he once bribed National Assembly members. They suddenly opened the book of remembrance now that Obasanjo attacked their collective insatiable desire for materialism. Nigerians must read between the lines. Senators cannot be clinging to the luxuries they presently enjoy only to turn to hapless Nigerians to pick the bill even on their empty stomachs.

Nigerians should find it curious that it is their representatives, I mean the senators in this instance, that are clamouring for increases in taxation at this point in time while the executive arm is saying there won’t be anything like that. Isn’t this a curious role reversal? Should it not have been the other way round? It is heartwarming though that President Muhammadu Buhari realised that the buck stops at his desk and has said there won’t be any increases in taxation. I commend him for that. I also commend the creative ways he has chosen to go about the dwindling government revenue without necessarily overburdening Nigerians to sustain the luxurious lifestyle of some public servants.

What the government has done is to follow the maxim that a child looks to the front when he falls; but when an adult falls, he looks backwards to see what made him to fall. Jumping to raise taxation so soon cannot be the product of any rigorous analysis of the Nigerian economic crisis. As a nation, we must know what led us to where we are to be able to better appreciate the way out; I mean we must reminisce. That is what an adult does. To begin to ask for increased taxation and introduction of new taxes is out of the question because it is not just the fall in crude prices that is responsible for the country’s economic downturn. Rather, it is corruption; monumental corruption, the type that eyes have not seen and ears have not heard. So, it is that corruption that we must take out before asking people to bake again. To keep baking under the prevailing circumstance is akin to fetching water into a basket. Anybody who made his money genuinely must be wary of such sense of reasoning.

If we must do anything about taxation, it is to widen the net. Let the people enjoying luxurious lifestyle also pay luxurious tax. Let churches and mosques with investments pay. We can also consider tolling the major expressways in the country to sustain the maintenance of those roads. But to want to raise Value Added Tax (VAT) because Nigeria is the country paying the lowest VAT (even if I do not know the proof for this or what it is supposed to mean) seems to me a mere regurgitation of jaded economic theories or, at best, genuine intentions in climes where there are already structures to prevent such revenue from being plundered, or deny the plunderers the right to perpetual injunctions, so that they can speedily have their day in court when they lust after public funds.

As far as I am concerned, increased taxation can only be an option when all else had failed; I mean it should be the last resort if indeed, national development is the true reason for the hike. The Buhari administration has done what looks to me to be imaginative or creative in addressing the gaps in the budget proposals. For instance, it talked about possible cuts in the country’s cash call elements by innovative financing which is about N1trillion; the possibility of getting private sector financing for some projects; looking into the activities of some government ministries, departments and agencies that are generating money in dollars and remitting in Naira; etc. So, one sees a government that is unwilling to tear Nigerians’ pockets in the name of making up for shortfall in government revenue. It is the senators that MUST (to borrow their emphasis) show that they care by acting on President Buhari’s letter and facilitate the war against money laundering. As a matter of fact, the bills must be debated and passed expeditiously if the senators are desirous of fighting corruption. Another point is; there is so much money hanging out there that would be useful if it is recovered. The Assets Management Corporation of Nigeria (AMCON), for example, has just expressed frustration with the N5.4trillion debt owed it by a handful of Nigerians. If only the Senate can address all of these, we may end up discovering that we do not need to raise taxes.

We may not have to arrest Dasuki and others involved in Dasukigate another time, but we would have succeeded in sending the message across that such plundering of the national patrimony would no longer be treated with kid gloves, thus minimising the propensity of public officials to want to feed fat on public funds.

January 31, 2016
In the court of public opinion: Anti-corruption versus rule of law?

Those calling for the supremacy of rule of law, regardless of the justness of the law or of the ethicality of the interpreter of the law, may be overlooking the danger that the call for strict constructionist view of the concept may hold.

One of the most insidious of mythological civic narratives is that our leaders are selfless public servants serving a higher call and order. In a lesser quoted part of Lord Acton’s power/corruption axiom, he offers the chilling statement: “There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it.” Generally, people employed in the public sector are not selfless public servants. They are simple people whose job it is to serve the public. They work for the public, but does that really ennoble them? By the evidence of corruption and venality arrayed about us, the answer must be emphatically, “No.” Yet we still fall prey to the mythology. High public office…. allows some to convince themselves and project to the world that they are all that! No one is all that—and most everyone, including most everyone in public life, is a whole lot less than all that. And that is okay. But it is also why transparency is so very important— Joseph Ferguson in a foreword to Transparent Government: What it means and how you can make it happen by Donald Gordon.

One word that is ubiquitous today in print, broadcast, and social media, more than ever before, is Rule of Law. Not since the death of Umaru Yar’Adua, a president who included running a government in compliance with the rule of law in his presidential mission, has the lofty phrase been so popular. When a word is repeated as frequently as rule of law has been since the new government’s efforts to fight corruption by investigating and prosecuting individuals who are suspected to have abused the country’s financial management principles and values, ordinary citizens who are not members of the bar or the bench should be wary. Like some of those who requested me to comment on ‘media-hyping’ of this phrase, I am tempted to look at George Orwell’s 1946 essay, “Politics and the English Language.”

In Orwell’s essay, he raised many issues about the relationship between words and the meanings they are intended to convey. He said among other things: “Our civilisation is decadent and our language — so the argument runs — must inevitably share in the general collapse…. Political language — and with this is true of all political parties, from Conservatives to Anarchists — is designed to make lies sound truthful and murder respectable, and to give an appearance of solidity to pure wind.” Orwell’s assertion that political speech is more often used to conceal than to inform and often used to justify the unjustifiable may apply to today’s obsession by pundits in both traditional and social media with the rule of law as if it is an ideology-free concept.

Are these two words: anti-corruption and the rule of law mutually exclusive or should they be bandied about as if each refers to something that is oppositional to the other? Partisan politicians are enthusiastic in emphasising the importance of rule of law at the expense of fighting corruption. In some cases, some media pundits are even asking President Buhari to refrain from fighting corruption, if doing so might jeopardise the non-negotiability of the rule of law. Understandably, ordinary citizens seem to be confused by calls for privileging of rule of law principle over rejection of corruption, even though the two camps are presumably shooting for the same thing, good governance.

Two issues that have been raised by those who see themselves as whistleblowers against acts that show lack of respect for the rule of law since the beginning of the ongoing fight against corruption is the fact that some who have been given bail by the courts are denied the benefit of bail by the federal government. Undoubtedly, it is not encouraging for any government to do anything to suggest that it does not respect the independence of the judiciary. But one area that is often ignored is that the judiciary, like other sectors of the polity and society, also has its own bad eggs as it is in all professions and occupations in the land.

Borrowing Joseph Ferguson’s concept of mythological civic narrative and Lord Acton’s assertion: “There is no worse heresy than that the office sanctifies the holder of it, “it is logical to say that many of the politicians and media pundits who make efforts to privilege the principle of rule of law over the imperative of identifying, investigating, and prosecuting individuals caught with corrupt acts assume that the judiciary is right all the time. If time is taken to do forthright judicial criticism, it will be demonstrated that many judges use the space of discretion at their disposal to favour those accused of criminal behaviour and the sabotage of the state. For example, if it was not for the Administration of Criminal Act 2015, cases that have been put in the cooler in the name of rule of law since 2006 would not have seen the light of day, as they are now doing at the instance of the EFCC. The rule of law must protect all citizens. This is why most commentators emphasise equality before the law as the core of the political ideology that the law is the king as opposed to the king being law.

It is citizens at the bottom of the socioeconomic ladder in particular who have not enjoyed the principle of equality before the law that are now querying in letters to the editor section of newspapers and on blogs the new obsession with the rule of law on account of time between the approval of bail and the actual release of suspects by law enforcers. The masses seem to be wondering if the word rule of law is to conceal rather than to reveal, whether the repetition of the phrase is not an attempt to take attention away from efforts to fight corruption. Citizens who are enraged by the absurdity of appropriation of funds meant for improvement of the life of all or to fight Boko Haram’s war against the nation are worried that the elite are doing what they have always done best: create confusion or distraction in order to prevent any meaningful intervention by those committed to deter corruption through a crime and punishment initiative.

President Buhari may not have provided a grand narrative of how he plans to govern the country, he has, undoubtedly, clearly stated that no change can come to the economy if and until looters of the economy and the polity in the past are made to return their loot. Many people would argue that If President Buhari had any personal interest in keeping certain persons in jail over the mismanagement of $2.1 billion approved for the purchase of arms to fight Boko Haram, he would or could have given those involved in the case a graver charge. They could have been charged for sabotaging the country at a time of war and thus endangering the population. And doing this would have kept everybody involved in jail until their innocence is proven, as such charge would fall under the category of capital offence.

Historically, the ritualistic conceptualisation of rule of law had been challenged in the past in many societies. Thomas Paine once said in “Common Sense” that unjust laws threaten the religiosity of the rule of law, just as Henry David Thoreau said in “Civil Disobedience”: “Thus, under the name of Order and Civil Government, we are all made at last to pay homage to and support our own meanness.” Those calling for the supremacy of rule of law, regardless of the justness of the law or of the ethicality of the interpreter of the law, may be overlooking the danger that the call for strict constructionist view of the concept may hold. At a time that corruption has almost brought the country to bankruptcy and international receivership, it is necessary for pundits to be guided by Lord Acton’s axiom that the office may not sanctify the holder. In all the branches of government in our country: executive, legislative, and judicial, the office does sanctify the holders. The two bills being sent by the presidency to NASS may just be a good beginning in the journey to kill corruption before corruption kills the country along with the rule of law.

January 31, 2016
Abubakar Malami’s inquisitorial tendency

Given the terrible harm and retrogression corruption has brought upon Nigeria, it is no surprise that President Muhammadu Buhari is fixated on combating it, almost to the large scale exclusion of other great policies needed to restructure and reposition the polity. He has shown determination and grit in fighting the malaise, and he has swooped on it with the frenzied passion of a crusader running out of time. He is right to be very urgent about the problem. But the greater question is whether the president has the appropriate solution. So far, in fact, there has been no solution in the real sense of the word. Those alleged to be corrupt are being named and shamed, even to the point of subverting the rule of law. But because the people have massed behind him, the president reposes greater confidence and trust in his own methods. There has also been no mention of the political economy of corruption, which is even more crucial to combating the menace. But this, too, apparently requires some depth and holistic approach, and exasperatingly far too much patience than the president and his fervent supporters are willing to accommodate.

What is indisputable is that the president and many of his aides see the anti-corruption war simply and singularly in terms of law and order. Any other perspective is to them a luxury of theorising. The vast majority of Nigerians agree with the president. They see no exotic theory in the harmful impact of corruption; so why bother about the theory of its origins. During last year’s All Nigeria Judges Conference, President Buhari should have taken the opportunity to offer very profound thoughts on the judicial arm , the problem it faces, the remedies to those problems, and other transcendental and original perspectives on the rule of law and the defence of human rights vis-a-vis the challenges of governing and policing a complex and developing society. Instead, he spoke in his usual reprobationary language about the judiciary performing below public expectation, and the need for that arm of government to redeem its ‘faltering’ image.

Among other complaints, the President Buhari singled out “allegations of judicial corruption…dilatory tactics by lawyers sometimes with the apparent collusion of judges to stall trials indefinitely thereby denying the state and the accused persons of a judicial verdict…and negative perception arising from long delays in the trial process that have damaged the international reputation of the Nigerian judiciary, even among its international peers.” But these are just symptoms of the very fundamental problems plaguing the judiciary. While the Buhari presidency has upped its criticisms against the judiciary, with Abubakar Malami, the Attorney General of the Federation making strident and inquisitorial remarks, nothing concrete has been done to tackle the problems from the root. Little will be done, it seems, because the government’s understanding of the problem is restricted to law and order, and nothing in-between.

The Attorney General’s prognosis is a curious, hubristic misperception of judges and the judiciary. It requires extensive quotation to appreciate the full import of his opinion. Said he: “As we may be aware, this administration promised Nigerians that it will promptly address the challenges facing our nation in the three areas of corruption, economy and security. Let no one be in doubt, the legitimate expectation of Nigerians in this regard shall be met. In this regard therefore, I am reiterating that the fight against corruption shall be total and will not exclude judicial officers, who are found wanting. After all, it is beyond doubt that a corrupt judge cannot meaningfully contribute to the fight against corruption. In reality, it cannot be over-emphasised that systemic corruption and impunity are prevalent in Nigeria, and that they cut across all sectors of the society, unfortunately, including the judiciary – an institution that is universally believed to be the hope of the common man. Ideally, the judiciary in a democratic state ought to be accountable less to public opinion and more to public interest. It should discharge its constitutional roles by being principled, independent and impartial.”

This unflattering view from the chief law officer of Nigeria is further reiteration of the misconception both of the judiciary as an arm of government and the fundamentals of corruption. Mr. Malami is a young legal officer who apparently lacks an understanding of the weight of the judiciary’s place and role in the polity. That arm of government does not exist, despite its numerous imperfections, to be kicked about by the executive arm. It is a co-equal arm, one that is self-regulating, self-administering, and, had the executive at the states level not been short-sighted and obstinate about holding on to the judicial purse strings, would have been self-financing in the truest sense. Paragraph 21 (b)and (d) of the Third Schedule to the Constitution puts the onus of doing all that Mr. Malami spoke about on the National Judicial Council. Without making it obvious, and as an indication of a sublime understanding of the place of the judiciary in the sustenance of democracy, both the president and Mr. Malami should have spoken of this third arm of government in terms that do not give the impression of its subordination to the executive for either disciplinary or political reasons.

The danger of the executive arm speaking openly and pejoratively about the judiciary is that it increasingly encourages commentators — most of them ignorant of how the fulcrums upon which a society is balanced must be positioned — to unleash venomous and destablising attacks on that generally silent arm of government. Emotions are being whipped up against the judiciary, and there are already careless talks about the need to get the judiciary to key to President Buhari’s programmes, especially the anti-corruption war. Even granted there is corruption in the judiciary, it would be a surprise for judicial officers and legal minds anywhere, whether at the executive, legislative or judicial arm, to forswear their high education and begin to talk of keying to anything. Surely, of all the professions, judicial minds know a lot about ideological posturing, not to talk of constitutional and procedural finesse. It is not the job of the judiciary to key to anything; their job is to ensure justice is served to the extent of the consistencies of behaviours, activities, programmes and policies with the laws of the country and its constitution.

The private opinions of Judges are often kept private, except when they deliver judgements that are perhaps shaped or coloured by their ideological and experiential leanings. The Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) sometimes rises in the defence of the independence of the judiciary, independence that is sadly being subtly eroded by the exaggerated impressions and careless summations of the executive arm. While it is true that corruption is present in the judiciary, just as it is also present in both the executive and the legislature arms, the solution is not to single out the judiciary for lampooning. Corruption in Nigeria is society-wide. It cannot be tackled simply by condemning one group or individual. In the case of the judiciary, it is even more dangerous to single them out, as the Buhari presidency seems to be doing, for blame for the slow pace of justice delivery or perversion of justice.

President Buhari’s summation on corruption in the judiciary is truly baffling. Has he asked himself why there is corruption in the judiciary and elsewhere? Has he taken a look at that arm of government’s funding over the years? Has he looked into the virtually collapsed infrastructure in the judiciary? Indeed, has he taken a comprehensive look at the justice system, right from when a suspect is arrested to the last stage of imprisonment in order to enable him design an amelioration programme? It is baffling that he talked about the slow pace of justice delivery without reflecting on the staff strength of the judiciary. And both he and Mr. Malami talked sanctimoniously about the outrage over judges’ corruption as if the judiciary is isolated from Nigeria’s other publics; as if corruption in the judiciary, because of its moral and religious undertones and implications, is somehow more reprehensible than corruption elsewhere.

What both the president and Mr. Malami are doing to the judiciary is even more damaging than the corruption they conclude has hobbled justice delivery. Mr. Malami, from his outrageous meddlesomeness in the Kogi governorship impasse, is clearly more politically partisan than first thought, or than is good for his own office and reputation. He should be offering unimpeachable advice about law and justice to the president and his cabinet, and standing watch over the sanctity and rectitude of the country’s laws and constitution. If he chooses to be derelict in his responsibilities, the president, who is the country’s overall leader, has the biggest responsibility of all to ensure that the country works. He should speak loftily of his programmes and reveal his appreciation of the elements of corruption beyond inquisition and policy ad hocism; he should let the country know where he stands ideologically, and how that would impact on his policies and programmes; he should give the country a glimpse of his vision for Nigeria and how it can be realised; and, among other things, also suggest the behavioural changes at the sublime level that should form the building blocks of the character of the Nigerian. Let him do these with the right savvy.

No one can of course defend corruption in any form, let alone in the judiciary, nor anywhere for that matter. But it is portentous when a disproportionate focus, borne out of ignorance of what constitutes corruption, is put on the judiciary. The president and Mr. Malami were either elected or appointed because it was thought they had a more than average understanding of how the laws of the land and the constitution could best be protected and defended. They should justify the confidence reposed in them rather than interminably bellyache over problems they are expected to solve with sublime skill and élan.

January 24, 2016