By Vitus Ozoke
The manner of Justice Chukwunenye Azuka’s death, as painful as it is, presents a unique opportunity for reflection and insight, and a window view into the dark and ugly corners and underbellies of Nigerian politics. The decomposing body of Justice Azuka, the lawmaker representing Onitsha 1 North Constituency, who was reportedly kidnapped on the eve of Christmas of 2024, was found in the lower bushes off the Second Niger Bridge on Wednesday, February 5.
Additionally, it offers a chance for a critical interrogation of the sorry state of Nigeria’s social and criminal justice system. The idea of using the murder of Justice as an occasion and opportunity for the discussion of the state of justice in Nigeria could not be any more ironic, yet fitting.
Yes, Justice was kidnapped and murdered – and will be buried. And that is sad and bad enough. But even sadder and worse is the everyday kidnap and murder of justice in Anambra State, in Igboland, and in Nigeria. It is the shock and the indecency of the social risqué inherent in the kidnap and murder of justice as an existential principle that we must now guard against.
Now, this is what we know. The decomposing body of Justice Azuka was found in the lower bushes off the Second Niger Bridge on Wednesday, February 5. A team of the recently constituted Anambra security outfit (Agunechemba) successfully arrested the culprits who led them to that scene of horror. Upon arrival at the scene, however, four bodies were discovered: Justice Azuka and “three others”.
I say three others not because I am too lazy to mention and write out their names. No, it is because their names are unknown, and may remain forever unknown and unknowable.
Read Also: AI Summit: Nigeria, France, 56 others launch platform to bridge digital divides
Their names may never be known because Nigeria, even with all the wealth it produces, does not maintain a medical and dental profile database, nor has it invested in the technology for forensic posthumous identification. And even though this technology and the experts can be externally sourced and imported, there is no governmental appetite for such “unnecessary” stress over common, non-honourable, disposable, and expendable citizens. And I cannot imagine that their kidnappers and killers left the victims’ wallets and identification information on their deceased bodies. So, those three bodies, presumably victims of the same group of kidnappers and killers, may remain forever unknown.
So, to the credit of the gallant men and women of Agunechemba, Azuka’s body has been recovered. Azuka will be given a befitting burial, whatever befitting means in this chilling orgy of deaths. His body will lie in state at the Anambra State House of Assembly Complex in Agu Awka, and his fellow politicians will converge to pay their last respect. His body will be buried. His children will know where their father is entombed and will receive financial compensation, including scholarship to university level, from the governor and the government of Anambra State. Why? Because he was a politician, and he was “honourable”. The three others, the unknown and unknowable three, will rot at the scene of the gothic horror. Their family will forever live with the pain of the vacuum of their closed, yet open, life. That is the irony of living and breathing injustice at the death of Justice. And that, sadly, will remain a tangential and collateral legacy of Justice Azuka.
Since the discovery of Justice Azuka’s mangled and decomposed remains, Governor Charles Soludo and the Agunechemba team have taken victory laps, as they should. The Agunechemba team, yes; their victory laps are well deserved. But, Governor Charles Soludo, no.
Professor Soludo was sworn-in and inaugurated governor of Anambra State on March 17, 2022. Hundreds, if not thousands, have been kidnapped and (or) murdered since Soludo has camped out at Agu Awka. Prior to his becoming governor, Soludo had seen insecurity up close and personal – or so it seemed. On Wednesday, July 31, 2021, during a political event at his Isuofia hometown, three police officers attached to Soludo, then a governorship aspirant, were killed by unknown gunmen. You would think that with that horrific experience, Soludo’s first order of business in Agu Awka would be a massive state of emergency on the perilous state of security (insecurity) in Anambra. It was not. Instead, it was this mad obsession with taxing Anambra people and businesses.
And now, on the eve of his re-election, which is scheduled for November 8, Soludo wakes up – suddenly – to insecurity. On January 18, a man scheduled for re-election constitutes the largest security operation known in the history of Anambra State and Igbo land.
Do not get me wrong: I commend the governor for that. I commend him for his sharp political instinct. But the security of Anambra people should not, never, be dictated by the whims and vagaries of politics. So, to Soludo his apologists who have argued that the governor moved quickly with the creation of Agunechemba on January 18, following the kidnap of Azuka on Christmas eve, I say drop that asinine argument. It is not a good argument for the governor.
The only thing worse than a governor that left the open sore of insecurity to fester is the governor who swung into security action only after a lawmaker and fellow politician was kidnapped. If Soludo’s close shave with death in 2021, when three of his security details were killed by the mysterious unknown gunmen, did not do it for him, then surely, the kidnap of a lawmaker, from an opposing political party, did not do it for him. Something else did. November 8 did. Politics did. And it is a damn shame!
The death of Justice in Anambra is also the death of justice in our society. With Justice Azuka’s kidnap and murder, the chickens of injustice may have come home to roost. Those wandering chickens have always been out there. They are the chickens of youth poverty and unemployment. They are the chickens of high cost of living. They are the chickens of hunger. They are the chickens of insecurity.
Finally, my deep sympathies for the kidnapped and murdered Justice Azuka. We must now ensure that justice is not buried with Justice.