The integrity of Nigeria’s judiciary is hanging on a thread.
The integrity would be further badly eroded by allegations like those made by retired Justice Musa Dattijo Mohammad.
Mohammad had retired three weeks ago after serving on the bench for several years and rising through the ranks to become one of the Justices of the Supreme Court.
During his valedictory service held on Friday, October 27, 2023, Mohammad raised several issues, among them the longstanding vacancies at the Supreme Court that have not been filled to date.
He noted that the apex court was left with only 10 Justices, instead of 21, as stipulated in the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended).
He also added that two geopolitical zones, the South East and North Central, have no Justices in the Supreme Court, alleging that this might be a deliberate plan by the government.
The questions and all the posers raised by Mohammad are pertinent questions of public interest and deserve to be adequately answered.
There were 14 Justices on the list of the Supreme Court in June 2022, when the current Chief Justice of Nigeria, Olukayode Ariwoola was appointed.
By the time the CJN was confirmed by the Senate in September 2022, the number had decreased to 13 with the retirement of Justice Abdu Aboki.
Even before the CJN came into office, his predecessor, Justice Tanko Muhammad, had begun a process to appoint more Justices into the Supreme Court, and as at January 2022, published notices requesting expressions of interest in Supreme Court vacancies, with the process progressing enough to the extent that the Nigerian Bar Association said a shortlist drawn had been drawn up but had excluded members of the bar.
As far as it is known to the public, no explanation has been offered as to why the recruitment process started in early 2022 and expected to lead to the appointment of more Supreme Court Justices was aborted.
In June 2023, one year after his appointment as CJN, another call for expression of interest was opened for the appointment of 10 Justices of the Supreme Court, with no reference made to the outcome of the process begun in 2022.
Five months after this process began, no fresh Supreme Court appointments have been made despite the urgency and direness of the personnel situation at the Supreme Court.
In Nigeria, as it is in most countries, the Supreme Court is the final arbiter in dispute resolution, and that critical institution must be beyond reproach if its decisions are to be of any value to the larger society.
For that reason, those who want to impute motives or impugn the reputation of the Justices must do so based on iron-cast evidence and in the appropriate quarters; for the sake of the system and in the interest of all of us.
Justice Mohammad also raised several pertinent issues that the relevant authorities must address.
He imputed a lack of transparency and accountability in the management of financial resources in the judicial arm of government and especially at the Supreme Court.
“We must commend Justice Mohammad for being candid enough to allow Nigerians a peep into the apparent rot in the judiciary”
Justice Muhammad also alleged that the current CJN, Olukayode Ariwoola, runs the judiciary without any checks and balances.
He equally spoke to how, by transferring the onus of determining outcomes of elections to the court rather than the voters, the judiciary is being increasingly compromised.
Justice Mohammad lamented that unlike in the past when “appointment to the bench was strictly on merit,” that is no longer the case as he also revealed how sectionalism has crept into the Supreme Court.
We must commend Justice Mohammad for being candid enough to allow Nigerians a peep into the apparent rot in the judiciary.
The housecleaning he called for is very important if we must restore public confidence in justice administration in Nigeria.
The third arm of government, the judiciary, is well set out and defined in Chapter V11, from Sections 230 to 296, beginning with the Supreme Court of Nigeria.
Its essence, caliber of personnel, recruitment, qualification and functions are well laid within this Chapter to the extent of establishing the fact that the Nigerian project only exists under the direct watch and management of the judiciary.
Anything to the contrary is an invitation to anarchy and chaos, and no society can survive under this condition.
Nigeria believes that with a very strong judiciary the mistakes of the other two arms of government (the Legislature and the Executive) can be spotlighted and corrected.
The judiciary cannot afford to make a slip more so where the liberty of the subject is at stake.
There is that strong belief that the Nigeria judiciary will curb the excesses of the other two arms of government.
The judiciary should not allow the people’s trust to be misplaced. Once a nation has an independent judiciary, there is the hope that any wrongdoing will be corrected.
The independence of the judiciary postulates not only that judicial officers are in the actual process of decision taking free from external direction by political and administrative functionaries of government, but also that the actual working of the machinery for the administration of justice is also free from and independent of those functionaries.
It is a calamity to have a judiciary that is subservient to executive or political pressures and influences, a judiciary that yields and defers to the sirens of power or that unjustly accommodates the demands of the rich and the privileged.
There is nothing to add to the damaging allegations leveled against the bench by Justice Mohammad on the importance of the judiciary in a democracy.
The judiciary, in particular, being the watchdog of people’s rights and liberty, should not hesitate to call to order anybody, institution or groups of people, however influential that threaten to destroy, disfigure or otherwise undermine the corporate existence of this great institution. The faith of the people in our judicial system must remain unshaken.
We therefore call on the NJC to conduct a high-level inquiry to undertake a thorough, prompt and impartial investigation of the claims made by Justice Muhammad, to establish the cause of the delays in the appointment of Supreme Court Justices and determine whether the delays were politically motivated.
We also call on the CJN to respond to the issues raised by Justice Muhammad in the interest of the integrity of the judicial branch of government.
The integrity of the Nigerian judiciary, as many believe, is hanging on a thread at this time, and will be further badly eroded by allegations like those made by Justice Mohammad.
