Govs who don’t sign death warrants disobey court – Adebajo
Govs who don’t sign death warrants disobey court – Adebajo
Briefly, tell us about your journey to the bench
My journey to the bench was mono-dimensional. I went into practice and I stayed in it for over 20 years before moving to the bench. Maybe I over-stayed in practice but my journey to the bench was directly that of a legal practitioner growing from the Bar and stepping up into the bench. But it is to be noted that a lot of the experience that I had were from the late Chief S.O. Moroundiya, a man from Ibadan whose chambers was located at Ikeja. I was with him for several years and there, I think, I cut my teeth in practice. He was a man of many parts and I can say that I learnt a great deal from him.
When was your most challenging period on the bench?
Well, when a judge is newly appointed, that initial stage is challenging because it is a fresh perception of the work; it is a different mindset. You have to get used to the judiciary; you have to get used to being the point of concentration and you have to get used to the fact that so much is expected from you, because so much has been given to you. So, that in itself is a challenge. And I think that you get to improve as you go along because of the various cases that come to you. It is not a question of dealing with pen and paper now. You are dealing with human lives and activities and whatever you do, when you give a judgment, the consequence will affect so many persons. For instance, I remember a land matter, one oba (monarch) was claiming that this vast area of land was under his sovereignty, the other people were saying no, we are not under your sovereignty, we stand on our own. And whichever way that judgment was going to go, it was going to affect the lives of so many occupants because so many people had built houses on this vast area of land. And now you might have to change who the owner is and who the occupants owe their right to stay on the land to. If you change that, it means that they have no land at all, as it happened in the case of the Onitire and Ojora. And so, when you face these things and you are writing your judgment, you take double care, you become cautious. Am I doing what is right? And at the end of the day, when the conscience of the judge allays his fears and he follows the law, he is able to do justice. He is comfortable that he has done justice, whichever way it goes. The fact that there is an appeal on it is neither here nor there for him; that is a different issue, but he would have done what he ought to have done.
What was your most challenging case?
I think it was. When you are affecting the lives of so many people, you are conscious that this thing has its consequences; you are extra careful.
We’ve heard of corrupt judges, was there ever a time that you were tempted by litigants during your time on the bench?
No matter how much the lifestyle of a judge tends to shield the judge from litigants, litigants would always come; people will always find a way or the other, but it is for the judge to use his discretion.
From your experience, how do you think judges can be shielded from corrupt practices?
Well, my experience is limited to Lagos State and I think that despite the fact that Lagos is a highly social environment, the judges have been able to shield themselves and even if you meet a litigant, you can just so easily walk away when he starts discussing his case.
Against the backdrop of what happened in Ekiti, how would you rate the level of security provided for judges?
There is hardly any security provided for judges in Nigeria today. It is next to nil and it shouldn’t be. As to what happened in Ekiti, I have given my own impression and it’s unfortunate that what I said was not followed. If it had been followed, a lot of things would be set right in the judiciary today. At that time, I said the Chairman of the National Judicial Council should shut down the judiciary in Ekiti State. If she had done so at that time, they would have found that there is a political quagmire and they would have had to address the issue of the judiciary and the safety of judges. Because the Constitution provides that it is only the Chief Judge of a state that would swear in an incoming governor. And it was the Chief Judge, who was slapped that now went to shake hands and swear in the man who…, well, I should not say much.
What is your assessment of the judiciary in the 2014?
I believe that the judiciary has always performed well and will continue to perform well. The judiciary itself knows when there has been an outside interference, but where I was saddened was when the Chief Justice of Nigeria markedly washed the dirty linen of the judiciary in the public. It shouldn’t be done because it affects the public perception of the institution itself. If there is a bad apple in a basket, you remove the bad apple quietly; you don’t empty the basket on the floor and start to push the apples around saying which one is bad. No! You gently remove the one that you believe should not be there and take it out. It is a discreet thing. If you are talking of extra-judicial, legal influence, is it only in this country? It goes on around the world. There is no government that does not wish to exert its influence on the court. In the United States election when Al Gore was contesting for the Presidency, you could see the Supreme Court divided along party lines and Al Gore lost. So why are we making so much noise here?
Are you saying that it is normal for the judiciary to be influenced by partisan politics?
No, that is not what I am saying. In America, the President will always appoint to the Supreme Court a candidate whose temperament is close to that of his party’s manifesto. So, Obama appointed a woman to the Supreme Court, whose temperament was more that of a Democrat than of a Republican. And a Republican President would appoint somebody whose temperament is that of a Republican and not of a Democrat. What I am bringing out is that there is nowhere that there is not some influence, but that doesn’t mean that we should, here in Nigeria, take out our judges, hold them up and dangle them out and say, “Hey, this is a corrupt judge.” It affects the institution itself.
Source: Nigeria Camera
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