{"id":60793,"date":"2022-11-28T16:19:00","date_gmt":"2022-11-28T16:19:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=60793"},"modified":"2022-11-28T16:19:00","modified_gmt":"2022-11-28T16:19:00","slug":"a-lying-chief-justice-of-nigeria","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/?p=60793","title":{"rendered":"A lying Chief Justice of Nigeria"},"content":{"rendered":"

By Farooq Kperogi<\/strong><\/p>\n

Twitter:\u00a0@farooqkperogi<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most Nigerian newspapers on Friday reported Kayode Ariwoola, Chief Justice of Nigeria, to have said in Port Harcourt that he was \u201chappy\u201d that the governor of his state, Seyi Makinde, was part of \u201cthe men of integrity group\u201d\u2014as five breakaway PDP governors describe themselves.<\/p>\n

The reports formed the basis of my latest column titled\u00a0\u201cAn Openly Partisan Chief Justice of Nigeria.\u201d\u00a0But shortly after the publication of my column\u2014and obviously in response to the profusion of comments that called out the CJN\u2019s unabashed partisanship\u2014the Supreme Court\u2019s Director of Press and Information by the name of Festus Awaneri Akande issued a statement yesterday in which he denied the facticity of newspaper reporting that Ariwoola said he was happy his governor was a member of the men of integrity group.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe wish to state unequivocally clear that the CJN, Hon. Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, GCON had never at any point said such during his brief remarks at the State Banquet organised as part of the events lined up for the commissioning of the two Judiciary projects undertaken by the Rivers State government,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n

Well, TheCable, a digital-native newspaper, found and shared a video clip of the CJN\u2019s comments in Port Harcourt that put the lie to this disavowal.<\/p>\n

In case you\u2019ve not able to watch the one-minute-27-second video, here\u2019s a transcript of the video TheCable shared on Twitter:<\/p>\n

\u201c\u2026I understand will continue to commission projects till his last day in office [tentative, lukewarm applause from the audience]. There are projects wide open all over the place. And that\u2019s why we should not be scared to have these men of integrity group, and I\u2019m happy that my home governor is one because, you know, he will, he will try to imitate his friend and in-law because if\u2014for my governor, you know, so His Excellency Governor Wike will always threaten that he will call back his sister if my governor fails to play ball [tepid, nervous laughter from the audience].<\/p>\n

\u201cAnd that\u2019s why if you see him following His Excellency [laughter from audience], my governor is afraid, you now, of his wife being recalled [audience laughter]. So, please, eh, I saw governor Wike almost mad with people. We have kept people waiting for too long. I shall not keep you waiting further. You are invited for dinner, and it\u2019s almost getting late for dinner. Please enjoy your dinner, sumptuous one, and God bless you. We see tomorrow.\u201d<\/p>\n

So, contrary to the press statement he caused his press and information officer to issue, the CJN gave his stamp of symbolic approval to the name Governor Wike and his gubernatorial flunkeys gave themselves in their revolt against their party\u2019s presidential candidate. He also said he was \u201chappy\u201d that his \u201chome governor\u201d was a member of the group.<\/p>\n

What exactly is he denying? It\u2019s beneath the dignity of the office of the Chief of Justice of Nigeria to lie so casually and so shamelessly about something as verifiable as what he said at a political event just a few days ago.<\/p>\n

What the CJN did and said in Port Harcourt, as several senior lawyers have pointed out, violates Rule 1(5) of the Judicial Code of Conduct, which states that “a judge must avoid social relationships that are improper…. or that may cast doubt on the ability of a Judicial Officer to decide cases impartially.”<\/p>\n

By traveling to Port Harcourt to commission Wike\u2019s projects; by lavishing extravagantly syrupy praises on Wike as if he were a professional praise singer; by describing governors who\u2019re revolting against their party\u2019s presidential candidate and chairman as \u201cthese men of integrity group;\u201d and by openly admitting that he was \u201chappy\u201d that his \u201chome governor\u201d was part of the group, the CJN has signaled that he has taken sides in PDP\u2019s internal disputes and won\u2019t be impartial to Atiku Abubakar and Iyiorcha Ayu whom his preferred politicians are up in arms against.<\/p>\n

But this is not about Atiku and Ayu. It\u2019s about the appearance of brazen judicial compromise during an election season in which the CJN will sit in judgment over the disputes of politicians.<\/p>\n

If I were the CJN, I would apologize for my grave indiscretion and verbal diarrhea instead of lying to cover my blunder. That\u2019s the path of honor.<\/p>\n

\u25aa\ufe0e Kperogi<\/strong>, a US-based professor, is of Nigerian descent.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By Farooq Kperogi Twitter:\u00a0@farooqkperogi Most Nigerian newspapers on Friday reported Kayode Ariwoola, Chief Justice of Nigeria, to have said in Port Harcourt that he was \u201chappy\u201d that the governor of his state, Seyi Makinde, was part of \u201cthe men of integrity group\u201d\u2014as five breakaway PDP governors describe themselves. The reports formed the basis of my […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":58506,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5782],"tags":[450,5281,83],"class_list":["post-60793","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-opinion","tag-cjn","tag-lying","tag-makinde"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60793","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=60793"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/60793\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=60793"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=60793"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/everyday.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=60793"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}