by
Tony Afejuku
Everybody who has been following the case, or,
better put, the allegation of certificate forgery against the Comrade
Governor of Edo State has been praying fervently for justice, good and
undiluted justice, to be delivered by the new Edo State Election
Tribunal hearing the petition tendered against Oshiomhole by his major
opponent in the last Edo gubernatorial election, Major-General Charles
Airviavbere. Of course, the Major General has since closed his case in
the tribunal in the same way that Comrade Oshiomhole has closed his -
although without being courageous enough to enter the dock. I found the
Comrade Governor’s refusal or unwillingness to enter the dock
unhealthily curious and negatively strange. Whatever the tactic that led
him and his robust team of silk-donning luminaries to do what he and
all of them have done is something we cannot ignore in our inquiry into
an exercise or an attempt to understand the conditions and nature of the
type of temperament, thought and morality of all conceivers, inspirers
and planners of the tactic. But we shall not do so straightaway.
The
Comrade Governor has closed his case without dwelling at all on the
matter of the allegation of certificate forgery levelled against him.
Why? I shall attempt to give a concise answer to educate him on the
needlessness to dodge the issue. But first, I feel the need to address
the issue of his opponent’s appeal regarding further witnesses the
Major-General needed to consolidate his case against him. The day
Governor Oshiomhole closed his case at the tribunal was also the day the
Court of Appeal ruled that Major General Airiavbere’s further witnesses
would not be allowed to tender whatever they meant to tender against
the Governor with respect to the matter of the latter’s alleged
certificate forgery.
From the reports I got from some
correspondents who were at the Court of Appeal, the ruling which was
spiced with lively but specious literary and legal terms and authorities
was at best an exercise done to address the question of form or, better
put, the manner in which the subject of the appeal got to the Appeal
Court. Oshiomhole’s lawyer confirmed this when he said in a television
interview that the appellant merely brought a contraband to the Appeal
Court. In other words, the appeal was a smuggled item improperly
imported (or shall we say, improperly exported?) to court. Thus the
Court of Appeal was right to reject the appeal. But I must ask: in such a
weighty matter of certificate forgery against a model Governor, was the
Appeal Court truly right to let form prevail over substance? Could it
not have been better for the Governor’s image and for justice’s image as
well, to be redressed, so to say, with the substance that would emanate
from the testaments of the now disallowed further witnesses? Of course,
how the Governor would have reacted to the disallowed witnesses’
testimonies would certainly, in my view, serve better the cause of
justice.
The appellant, let me admit, may have erred in the
manner of presentation in court of the issue in question, but the Appeal
Court ought to have remedied the error to serve the cause of undiluted
justice. Recently, Professor Itse Sagay, in a tribute to the late
Justice Kayode Eso, a “colossus” (who) has departed” our earth plane,
said as follows: the “Supreme Court held that ubi jus, ibi remedium”
meaning that “where there’s a right, there must be a remedy.” The
Supreme Court Sagay referred to is not the current Supreme Court, but
the Supreme Court of the golden age of the “judiciary in Nigeria”. Sagay
painstakingly went further to give us a picture of the world view of
the “golden” Supreme Court by way of quoting verbatim Karibi-Whyte, JSC
and Oputa, JSC, respectively, as follows: “I think the court has
attained a stature in the pursuit of justice that a claimant who has
established a recognized injury cannot be turned back on the ground that
he has not stated the head of law under which he was seeking a remedy”
(Karibi-Whyte JSC). Oputa, JSC gave further impetus to this “fundamental
pronouncement” about the guiding philosophy “so fundamental to the
administration of justice”, thus: “Where there is no remedy provided
either by the common law or by statue, the courts have been urged to
create one. The courts cannot, therefore, be deterred by the novelty of
an action.”
I submit that the Court of Appeal in disallowing
Major General Airiavbere from calling further witnesses to further help
his case against his electoral opponent whom he has accused of
pre-election rigging, deterred itself by the novelty of an action. The
Court of Appeal has clearly not used its discretion judiciously to
further the administration of justice in our country.
Whether we
like to hear it or not, this case of certificate forgery against
loquacious and now on un-courageous Governor Oshiomhole is vital to
giving the judiciary in Nigeria a modicum of good reputation that it is
losing and a well-wrought zinc over its dilapidating temple.
Major
General Airiavbere’s lawyer, also in the same television interview
cited above, said the failure of the appeal is not fatal to their case
meaning, in my view, that his team has an hors d’oeuvre to serve in the
tribunal and court of justice. I hope so - in a negative sense. This
year, rolling to the next, may be called Nigeria’s judiciary’s annus
mirabilis. I hope so - in a positive sense – maybe. Then we shall be
heading to a renewed golden age in Nigeria’s judiciary. Maybe not.
NigerianTribune
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