Era of extra-judicial protests

Call it an era of protests and you will certainly not be wrong. Organised extra-judicial protests within and outside of the court premises by groups and individuals believed to be sponsored are now becoming fashionable across the country.

Most times, some of the followers lack basic understanding of what the protest is all about. As far as they are concerned, it is another means of survival.

we learnt that most times, the protests are financed by aggrieved persons, whose interests are majorly aimed at influencing public opinion against their opponents.

But it was not certain however who was behind the latest protest in Abuja, which took place outside the Supreme Court complex last weekend.

The business-minded protesters had stormed the venue at about 10 am, demanding that alleged corrupt judges step aside, pending the outcome of investigations on the allegations against them.

As if verbal words were insufficient, the crowd, which danced freely to their own music, displayed placards bearing various inscriptions such as ‘No’ to corruption in the judiciary; When a judge stuffs illicit cash in his shoes, water don pass garri; Haba, NJC, 73 judges were indicted for breach of judicial oath and misconduct, not even one has been prosecuted or jailed’.

Others are, ‘Stop corruption before it stops you’; ‘Don’t get it twisted, judiciary is not on trial, only corrupt officials are’ and ‘Justices are to interpret the law they are not empowered to interpret hard currencies’. There was also another that says: “In the struggle to salvage the judiciary, every onlooker is either a coward or a traitor”.

Although the protesters under the aegis of The Forum of Non-Governmental Organisations in Nigeria, were prevented by security operatives from gaining enterance into the apex court’s premises, they nonetheless delivered on their mandate.

Led by its chairman, Mr. Wole Badmus, the group later made a detour and stopped over at the entrance of the National Assembly. At the gate of the National Assembly, Badmus said his group was prepared to mobilise 50 other groups to besiege the courts of the affected judicial officers, if they fail to step down.

Badmus believed that unless something urgent was done, the few bad eggs in the judiciary would spoil the good ones. “That is why we have decided to add our voices to the raging controversy over the arrest of some judges and justices over alleged corruption. And we are calling on them to step down now until they clear their names of the allegations levelled against them”, Badmus said.

The leadership of Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) recently made a u-turn on its earlier position concerning judges accused of corruption and professional misconduct by the Directorate of State Security Service (DSS) by urging those who were accused of corruption to step aside from presiding over matters until they are proven innocent of the allegations.

The issue of whether they should step aside or not has remained contentious between the NBA and National Judicial Council, which has insisted that there was no basis for asking the judges to step aside.