By Mobolaji Sanusi
“The best time for you to hold your tongue is the time you feel you must say something or bust.”—Josh Billings
For a fortnight now, the raging question ruminating through my mind is why a former governor, ex-minister of defence and a reputable politician of Rabiu Musa Kwankwaso’s stature will be caught on tape uttering words that impugn the character of justices of the country’s apex court. In a video posted on social media by one Saifullahi Hassan, designated as his media aide, Kwankwaso was seen making statement that diminishes the institution of the country’s Supreme Court.
While bemoaning the defection of incumbent Kano State governor, Abba Yusuf, from New Nigeria Peoples Party(NNPP), to the All Progressives Congress(APC), he spitefully projected Yusuf as an ingrate when he unconscionably declared; “he had forgotten that in 2019, I took him to the homes of all the supreme court judges in Nigeria to beg them. I and the governor met them in their villages and towns.”
These words by Kwakwanso were uttered without deference to the cautionary admonition of Williams Shakespeare when he said: “Give thy thoughts no tongue.” The former Kano governor’s statement was laden with negative innuendos capable of projecting our apex court’s justices as easily amenable to the whims and caprices of powerful men of power, wealth and influence that are always found seeking undeserved judicial favours for themselves, allies or their political parties. Kwankwaso’s crassly denigrative revelation affirms him as one of the impudent leaders/national figures compromising and destroying institutions in the country.
The general presumption is that not even the defence of an emotional turmoil of losing a political godson to his perceived political enemy, the ruling APC party is tenable a reason for Kwankwaso’s jettisoning of desired circumspection, being the irreducible minimum standard expected of a man of his political stature in both conduct and spoken words in the public space. His puerile squeal is no doubt capable of undermining the integrity of the nation’s apex court justices that are the repositories of judicial knowledge in our country.
Kwankwaso’s gaffe and self touted intervention of visiting the “villages and towns of the justices,” was meant to ‘compromise’ the apex court. The world over, litigants with or without pending cases before the courts are not expected to pay discreet, nocturnal or daytime visits to respected judges on The Bench. Such a visit is considered an ethical taboo.
The world is changing with odious occurrences, particularly in this part of the world, while our leaders remain unflustered. Recently, an agitating scenery was openly exhibited by some of our Federal High Court judges that yours sincerely find really disgusting after watching it on television and on social media platforms. This relates to their so called patronising visit to Chief Nyesom Wike, Minister of the Federal Capital Territory(FCT). The judges delegation was led by their Chief Judge, Hon. Justice John Terhemba Tsoho, OFR.
The chief judge, as leader of the team, was openly aired, soliciting in patronising manner, for Abuja land favours from the controversial minister. It is doubtful if the public would not doubt the outcome of any matter involving Wike that is brought before the judges now or in the near future. That visit, to say the least, was really repulsive as it has the potential of making the custodians of our Temple of Justice an object of avoidable scoffing in the public domain.
While growing up as a kid in this country, judges are not only reclusive but are also largely venerated as a special human specie, carefully chosen, to discharge salient judicial assignments. Their roles are viewed by the populace as reserved only for men of truly unimpeachable character amongst us. But sadly so, whatever decadence is being witnessed in the judiciary today is only a reflection of our judges being a product of the rotten society where they emanated from.
In contemporary times, things are changing as undue political and societal pressures are open-secretly being mounted on our judicial officers. We now live in a society that is experiencing abysmal moral decadence as mostly bad governance across levels of government is the order of the day. Rather than the promotion/pursuits of meaningful industrial and other productive ventures, we now have a system that gives impetus to the belief that the quickest and easiest way to acquire wealth or live a luxuriously good and easy life is either to be connected to government or to erroneously travel abroad which is now euphemistically branded as the JAPA syndrome.
This condemnable mindset of getting rich without being productive and not taking a no for an answer have severe consequences on institutions of state -especially the judiciary. To cure this mischief, President Bola Tinubu, GCFR, recently increased significantly, the remuneration package of our judges to a truly living wage. Despite this, most of them still pander to negativities that project that important arm of government in bad light.
The current Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, as head of the National Judicial Council, NJC, so far is trying her best to restore the soiled image of the judiciary. Not too long ago, thirty-four out of sixty-two lawyer-nominees for the Federal High Court were rejected because of integrity issues. This is just a tip of the iceberg as many believe in the incumbent CJN’s capacity and capability to recalibrate for the better, the judicial system in the country.
Despite her ongoing commendable reform efforts, CJN Kekere-Ekun needs to contend with powerful politicians and other influence peddlers as she forges ahead. This is because the rat race to sustain or win power by these terrible breed of power-intoxicated people that challenges anything unfavourable to them even when fair, and the deluge of election petitions emanating therefrom, have put our judges on the spot, exposing them to unimaginable temptations in the process. One of the many unfortunate onslaughts on judges of our courts is the recent obloquy against judges of the apex court by Kwankwaso.
So far, no single word has been spoken or written to debunk the grievously odious allegations against the sanctity of the nation’s judiciary by any of the serving justices of the apex court. But a retired justice of the court, Justice Musa Muhammad Dattijo, had audaciously pooh-poohed the incident by stating that he never met with Kwankwaso or Governor Yusuf anywhere or at anytime before and after retiring on October 27, 2023. “I speak for myself…My intervention is not intended to defend or indict anyone else….It is simply to clarify that I was not part of any such engagement,” the retired justice reportedly declared. Till now, Kwankwaso has remained on the mute mode rather than give further details for the observing public.
In a country where the challenge of wrongdoings has become perilous and most times derided, Dattijo’s courage deserves commendation.
The making of sweeping statements capable of denigrating the credibility of our apex court’s justices and by extension, the entire judicial system by anybody should be condemned. The nation’s grundnorm, explicitly guarantees freedom of speech and expression but with a proviso curtailing such right where uttered words risk harming the reputation of others or that of our public institutions.
Kwankwaso’s oblique is therefore actionably careless and slanderous. Not even when his visits to the justices’ towns and villages yielded negative result since it was Mallam Abdullahi Ganduje that was eventually awarded the governorship judgment of Kano state in 2019 by the appellate court.
Restating here that the judicial arm of government plays an important role in societal cohesion should be considered a litotes. This is because conflicts between individuals and institutions are inevitable and when they occur, parties involved need a neutral institution as a trusted arbiter to resolve such disputes. That is where the sacred duty of the judiciary and judicial officers come into play. Our politicians should leave the judiciary out of their condemnable shenanigans.
The Kwankwaso oblique remarks through his self-centred visits to towns and villages of judges, is obviously antithetical to the legendary Lord Denning’s inimitable observation when he said: “Justice must be rooted in confidence, and confidence is destroyed when right-thinking people go away thinking that the judge is biased.” The flaunting of visitations to homes of judges by litigants with pending cases, like Kwankwaso did, merely diminishes the credibility of pronounced judgments which never happened in this case. In this particular instance, it is gratifying that the appellate court justices, notwithstanding Kwankwaso’s discreet visits, overlooked his visitation request by subsequently going ahead to award judgment against candidate Yusuf in 2019.
The Kwankwaso-gate leaks should serve as a reminder to our judges to see especially our politicians as ‘caveat emptor’ that they must be kept at an arm’s length. Otherwise, the judiciary as an important institution for sustaining national cohesion and stability might become an object of mockery. Surely, incumbent CJN Kekere-Ekun will not allow this to happen.
For other loquacious politicians in Kwankwaso’s shoes aspiring for statesmanship, that notable Latin writer, Publilius Syrus has words of advice for them where he said: “Let a fool hold his tongue and he will pass for a sage.”
•Sanusi, former MD/CEO of Lagos State Signage & Advertisement Agency is currently managing partner at AMS RELIABLE SOLICITORS.(sms/whatsapp-07011117777).
