Nigerian judges, lawyers, politicians, clerics, security agencies: A parade of callous pretenders masquerading as virtuous 

By Prof. Nasiru Adamu Aliyu, SAN

In his play, “The Tragedy of Hamlet,” William Shakespeare wrote, “God has given you one face, and you make yourself another.”

Shakespeare highlights the duplicity of pretenders, as noted in the quote above. Similarly, Aristotle, one of history’s greatest thinkers, addressed the nature of pretenders in his ethical writings, stating, “The least deviation from truth will be multiplied later.”

He emphasized the importance of authenticity, warning that pretence can lead to significant consequences.

This concept resonates in Nigeria, where the elites appear caught in duplicity. At the same time, ordinary people suffer from poverty, subjugation, and a lack of awareness regarding their rights.

Many are unaware of their fundamental rights as citizens, further exacerbating their sufferings.

Nigerians at all levels are very selfish, self-centered people. Shame on our Nigerian Police, Department of State Security (DSS), Military, and other security agencies, and even the lawyers, whether from the public or private bar, for our complicity in the issues of turning a blind eye to the plight of ordinary men in Nigerian society.

The current thorny issue concerns the so-called treason charges against minors before the Federal High Court in Abuja.

The judges in the Federal High Court, politicians, lawyers, police, DSS, correctional service Centres, clerics, governors, president, and other stakeholders have the eyes and the conscience to detect right from wrong when minors from their respective constituencies are arrested by the police and other security agencies and handed them over to the Police Headquarters Abuja for whatever reason known to them.

In the eyes of Nigerian elites, self-preservation comes first, and we are all complicit and not ready to see and act truthfully with courage and fear of God.

It is not within the writer’s contemplation that people who commit crimes should not face justice.

No! Far from that, there shall be decorum, decency, fairness, and equality between citizens, and no discrimination between white-collar crimes and other crimes in terms of treatment.

There should be no disparity or preferential treatment between crimes committed by people in society.

The Nigerian Government is still unable to effectively fight and defeat corruption and bribery, banditry in the North-West, and the Biafra Mondays sit-at-home in South-Eastern Nigeria, as well as other kidnappings and criminal activities in the South-West and South-South regions of Nigeria.

There is only lip service paid to addressing national issues and challenges.

The Buhari government and now the Tinubu government may pretend to be combating these menaces, yet all terrorist activities and criminal acts remain unabated.

We dare to arrest, detain, and “prosecute” (to only God knows how long) Nigerian protesters, even if they are adults.

Still, the Nigerian military cannot defeat ragtag bandits and other criminals in Nigeria.

The sooner we realise and accept our collective failures, the better. We may argue about the legality and the rest of the purported charges of treason attracting the death penalty against these minors and even the majors among them.

Yes! The death penalty—you heard me right.

Still, the fact remains that these individuals and the children are sons of nobody, which is why the politicians, lawyers, judiciary, police, and Nigerian correctional services centre (if detained in their facilities) officers have always remained adamant about these kinds of injustices.

Although I must admit, one will sometimes find a semblance of sympathy from the correctional services officers, much more so than from the police.

However, this is also without prejudice to the entrenched corruption and the denial of appropriate meals to inmates.

Whether it is the fault of the government or the correctional services officers, the duo knows best. But just imagine if my son or yours (as elites) were either delinquent or happened to be in the wrong place at the wrong time, including the son of the police prosecutor who shamelessly addressed the press, asserting that he is prosecuting treasonable offences for an attempt to topple a democratically elected government of Nigeria.

Would we be arguing from the same perspective and trying to place things into the so-called legal perspective on the legality or propriety of arresting and detaining minors over the so-called hoisting of the Russian flag or any other country’s?

One thing is clear: the elites lack empathy and compassion for ordinary Nigerians.

These are not just values but the foundation of a just society. We are slowly drifting into a failed nation, yet we are still deceiving ourselves with falsity and impudence.

It is apparent, as expressed by respected legal luminaries such as Chief J.B. Daudu, SAN, who expressed fear about the possibility that the offences alleged could have been mere offences such as breaches of public peace, unlawful assembly, and common offences of theft, etc., under the penal codes of the respective states where the offences were alleged to have been committed.

However, because of the usual impunity of the Nigerian police and other security agencies, the defendants were moved and detained in the Federal Capital Terrority (FCT), Abuja, under the guise of treasonable offences within the jurisdiction and competence of the Federal High Court.

Also, Mr. J.B. Daudu, SAN, submitted that the Attorney General of the Federation has no locus to charge the minors and the defendants for offences committed within their respective states.

This will be an argument for another time. However, the million-dollar question is, “Why were they (minors & co.) not charged before the Federal High Court in the respective states where they were alleged to have committed the offences, such as Kaduna and Kano, where there are two (2) and three (3) resident Federal High Court judges, respectively?

” In my humble opinion, the minors were removed from Kano and Zaria and detained in Abuja as part of a troubling pattern among Nigerian security agencies.

This practice appears to be aimed at oppressing, intimidating, and dehumanising these individuals while also serving the interests of the security agencies to create a favourable impression on the Tinubu Government.

Such actions seem to attempt to mask these agencies’ significant shortcomings in effective intelligence gathering and utilisation.

Nigeria is a country of charlatan elites: lawyers, judges, politicians, so-called elders of the nation, human rights activists, and religious clerics.

Some came out to oppose the End Bad Governance protests based on the increase in petrol pump prices and the high cost of living, calling on people to be law abiding followers, but they later abandoned them when they were arrested and detained.

It is a legitimate expectation for people to demand accountability and empathy from their leaders and government.

As we know, the so-called elders and the clerics have always been imploring citizens to be patient and understanding and overlook shortcomings and harsh government policies.

Still, none did the same in calling the Tinubu Government to forgive and overlook the wrongs of these so-called EndBad-Governance protesters.

Why so? I cannot understand! It was only when it became a national and international embarrassment to the Nigerian government that President Tinubu quickly asked the Attorney General of the Federation to terminate the phantom treason charges against the minors after being detained for over 2 months.

Therefore, it is high time for the leaders and the elites in Nigeria to stop these pretences and start being genuine and honest in taking in the plight of ordinary Nigerians.

Nigerian institutions, leaders, and most clerics always concern themselves with ensuring they do not provoke the anger of the self-aggrandised and serving interests of state governors and the president, as opposed to justice, fair play, and national interest, because these two sets of persons hold people’s resources in their hands.

But there will come a time when we will pay dearly for our silence and complicity. However, there may still be time for us to change this narrative.

The judges and lawyers ready to do what the state governors and the president want at all costs must have a rethink for the nation’s future and our peaceful living in Nigeria.

Nigeria is a country where courts resolve political cases with all seriousness and speed and decide to ignore the rights of ordinary Nigerians to be tried fairly and with dispatch.

A country whose system and the judiciary give preference and attention to political and election-related cases over and above the fundamental human rights of people to be tried fairly, with dignity, and with all the swiftness required is heading to doom.

Surprisingly, the prosecutor of the purported treason charges against the end-bad governance minors had the audacity on National TV to say that the defendants were not minors but were adults who did not want democracy to thrive in Nigeria, and they wanted to end the democratic government in Nigeria!

So what? What has democracy done to Nigeria? Apart from squalor, hardship, corruption, and chauvinism, etc.?

It is a fundamental right to express oneself, “I do not like the Nigerian type of Western liberal democracy,” and “I stress and affirm that Western liberal democracy is not and has not yielded any positive result for Nigeria and Nigerians” from 1979 to 2024.

But it only serves the interest of the selfish demagogic politicians who add no value to the country but corruptly and unjustly drain its resources; the Western liberal democracy has woefully failed in Africa.

I challenge anybody to contradict me that the Chinese or Russian type of democracy has not done better for their national development than what liberal democracy does to the national development of almost all African countries, particularly Nigeria.

Be that as it may, the order for the release of the minors by President Tinubu is a direct slap to the pathological and shameless lies of the police prosecutor, who publicly, without conscience and fear of God, came out to argue that the defendants they charged to court for the purported offence of treason were not minors.

What an embarrassment to the police prosecutor, amounting to a clear breach of the rule of professional ethics for all lawyers.

We may recall, whether we like it or not, that the Borno State’s Boko Haram insurgency and its multiplier effects on the whole nation for almost 5 years were ignited first by injustice and the taking of the law into the hands of some policemen in Borno State Command when, in July 2009, they extra-judicially killed Mohammad Yusuf (the ex-leader of Boko Haram terrorists) after the Nigerian military captured and handed him over to the Nigerian police for interrogation and possible prosecution in law court; up till now, there has been no legal account or repercussion for the failure of the police to follow due process in the execution of the leader of Boko Haram.

If care is not taken, this is what will also happen to the arrest, detention, and arraignment of these dehumanised and malnourished minors over a phantom charge of treason.

I believe what aggravated the ordeal of these minors is that they are of Northern extraction, whose politicians are cowards and cannot speak out for their people against injustice in order not to be accused of opposing the Federal Government or be refused juicy positions in the Senate, National Assembly, and the Tinubu Government.

Alas! Except for Senator Ali Ndume! It is time for the Nigerian judiciary to be more responsive, rise to its responsibilities, and ensure it curtails the excesses of the Nigerian security agencies and the Nigerian police in particular.

The rule of law and equality before the law should be the watchword of the Nigerian judiciary, not just to please governments in power, whether federal or state.

I stand to be contradicted; none of the state’s judiciaries have the guts to give judgment(s) against state governors/government when the state governor/government is seriously and really interested in a matter.

Recently, there have been states where the state governments demolished properties worth billions of Naira.

Still, the state’s judiciary could not live to its sacred duty and give respite to the victims of unlawful demolitions by at least granting interim restraining orders pending hearing the substantive matter, as many applications had been turned down, not basing reasons for refusal on any sound judicial and equitable basis.

It is noteworthy that, about the said land cases in the state, a High Court judge declined to grant an ex parte order allowing for the Executive Governor to be served with court processes through substituted means via the office of the State Attorney General.

This decision was influenced by the undue and unwarranted fear and apprehension exhibited by certain judges in the state, leaving the Plaintiff/Applicant with the only option to serve the governor with the court’s documents personally.

How and which governor of a state in Nigeria could be served personally with any court process? However, the same applications ex parte were made before the Federal High Court in the state were granted, and even judgments against the state government were given.

The state government was ordered to pay billions of naira for the breach of the rights of the applicants as compensation.

Had that state’s judiciary summoned courage with fear of God and treated the state government and the applicants equally before it, the wealth created in the state and the properties worth billions of Naira would not have been lost, and the public fund would have been spared from being paid as judgment debts and compensations.

Judges should be fearless and free from any consideration other than fear of God and justice upon which they took the oath of office under the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, to do and treat every person and authority in Nigeria equally without fear or favour.

Can it be said that all Nigerian judges are fearless and uphold the scale of justice evenly when hearing and determining cases where the state or federal government has a serious interest in the matter(s)?

I will unequivocally answer with a capital NO! Even where some readers disagree with the opinion expressed by the writer in this write-up on this point, the conscience of a complicit judge would whisper the truth into his mind to prick it as to the truthfulness of the assertion.

The judiciary in Nigeria has a responsibility to check and change itself for the betterment of this country by taking bold steps, just as in July 2024, the Nigerian Supreme Court took giant strides with its decision in the case of AG of Federation v AG Abia State & Ors, which forced all the state governors to conduct at least a sham and incredible local government election, at least to access federal allocations of local governments in their respective states.

But in the same vein, some judges and security personnel (though not many in Nigeria) are worthy of salute because they are courageous and uphold equity and justice for all and sundry, regardless of which case is before their courts.

Unfortunately, these judges are not assigned cases by their chief judges involving matters in which the government is interested.

The reasons are not far-fetched; rather, the lack of financial independence and politicians being adept blackmailers who always find ways to scandalise the chief judges.

These narratives must change to enable our country to develop and progress as in other countries where the judges and the judiciary are courageous.

There is no doubt that the Nigerian judges are brilliant, but their performance is hindered by corruption and the factors highlighted above.

It is pertinent to also applaud social media and the journalists, despite their shortcomings and their initial complicity in keeping mum over the detention of the minors before the defendants “dramatized” and employed self-help tactics, which yielded results and drew the attention of both national and international media to their unfair and unjust detention connected to their arraignment on the so-called treason and treasonable charges.

Nevertheless, the journalists must be commended for doing a good job, which compelled shameless politicians, lawyers, and other religious clergymen to leap into the fray and suddenly begin to use it as a propaganda or political tool to attack the federal government instead of looking inwards at our nonchalant attitudes towards the problems and plights of common men in the country.

These hypocritical pretenses have led us to where we are now in this country. The origin of the banditry by Fulani kinsmen in Nigeria was a result of neglect and injustice meted out to them in connivance with the local police, magistrates, area/Sharia court judges, and local chiefs who usurped and sold grazing lands and colonial cattle routes, making their livelihood and survival impossible.

However, Nigerian leaders and government seem not to have learned lessons from history, but time and posterity will judge us as a nation that succeeds or fails!I will end this write-up by saying that whether we take or dismiss this piece (write-up) seriously, the truth must be told, and it will surely manifest itself one day.

Aliyu, writes from the Department of Public Law, Bayero University, Kano: nasiraliyu@gmail.com, +2348035883225.