Errors are bound to happen, They are part of life. Somehow, someone, somewhere is making an error without attuning his mind to it. Nobody is above mistake is a common phrase. It signifies that no matter how big, brilliant or careful a person is, he can make mistakes.
The Yoruba put it succinctly: Asise o kan ogbon meaning mistakes still happen irrespective of wisdom. Some mistakes happen that leave the public speechless. How did it happen? They wonder. How could a physician, as we have heard before, forget his scalpel in a patient’s womb after surgery? How? How? How? Determining the how becomes an endless question.
The how did it happen question is being asked across the country today following the contradictions in the verdict of the Court of Appeal in the Kano State governorship election dispute read in open court on November 17 and the certified true copy (CTC) of same released on November 21. It is a worrisome development, which has divided lawyers, politicians and others.
In the judgment read in open court, Justice Moore Adumein upheld the tribunal’s decision, sacking Governor Abba Yusuf. But in the CTC, the verdict, in one breathe, quashed the the tribunal’s verdict and in another, affirmed the same decision. How can there be two judgments in one, as it seems to be the case in this instance?
How can a verdict be of the same side of a coin? How can the court give with one hand and take away with the other? How can the court blow hot and cold at the same time? What and how happened? It is trite that the open court judgment must be in sync with what is in the CTC. From the little that I know about the judiciary, the CTC is derived from the open court proceedings. It is a reflection of court proceedings duly captured for the record.
It is the document required for the filing of an appeal, if a party is so minded. It is also of benefit for private and public use. There is no other way to get judgments delivered in the past than to apply for the CTC whenever there is need for it, even 30 years hence. The reason is obvious: the court cannot sit all over again to deliver that same judgment.
In such a situation, the CTC comes handy. So, the open court judgment and its CTC must be the same, without contradictions, mix-ups or misstatements, except for typographical errors, when the human factor is at play. It is, therefore, befuddling how the Kano verdict error came about.
In what form was the judgment before the CTC was drawn up? Longhand, typewritten or typeset? In this age of technology, it is most likely that his lordship typeset the judgment before reading it in open court. This then makes the drawing up of the CTC easy, as all the court registry needs do is get his lordship’s typeset copy without subtracting or adding anything to it; seal and sign it that it was drawn up under the registrar’s hand and his job is done.
How then did the words not in what was read in open court creep into the CTC? The officer and others who drew up the CTC have questions to answer. Justice Adumein could not have read something in open court only to contradict himself in the CTC. His Lordship could not have committed that costly mistake since he knows the consequences of such action.
It is implausible that he would do that under the prevailing political environment in which the judiciary has been so vilified. The political atmosphere has been polluted by politicians, and sadly, lawyers, who seem to have sworn to run down the judiciary at all costs. The contradictions in the Kano verdict have armed them with a fresh weapon to attack the judiciary and they have been unsparing. I pity Justice Adumein most in the circumstance.
His own people in the law community, which should give him benefit of the doubt, are baying for his blood. Even though they know the truth, they have already made up their minds that the CTC is the true judgment of the court. How can a CTC with two differing consequential orders be the real verdict? Can two parties be the winner of the same case, as shown in the CTC? Only one party wins a case in court. A close look at the verdict from the beginning shows how the court’s mind was working.
Until it suddenly veered off course in its concluding part where it gave judgment to Yusuf and Nasiru Gawuna of the All Progressives Congress (APC), with one million naira costs in favour of the former. Was this an inadvertent error or was it deliberately done to paint the court black? The two other Justices, in their consenting opinions, said they abided by the leading judgment which sacked Yusuf after reading the “draft” (of the decision).
Does the content of that draft match the CTC? If it does not, who tampered with the judgment between when it was delivered and the CTC drawn up? Those behind this shameful and devilish act, which might have been done for filthy lucre, must be fished out and punished in order to save the judiciary from itelf.
The registry cannot wash its hands of this matter. It has questions to answer as the section that keeps the court’s records. Why did it mess up the judiciary this way? In a political terrain that is so poisoned against the judiciary, the registry should have known better than allowing itself to be used to further denigrate the institution. Heads must roll over this matter so as to assure the public that the judiciary, is still above board, contrary to what some, in this political season, say.
