Yahaya Bello And A Complicit Judiciary

 By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

Josiah Majebi is the fifth chief judge of Kogi State (in North-Central Nigeria) in four years and the fourth to exist almost entirely in the pocket of the state governor. He has been in office as substantive chief judge since the beginning of February 2023, having acted in that role since 26 June 2022, when his predecessor, Richard Olorunfemi, retired. Henry Olusiyi served in that office for just under seven months from the end of June 2020 until January 2021. Sunday Otuh, who succeeded him, spent eight months in office before retiring in September 2021.

*Bello 

 

The last Chief Judge of Kogi State who attempted to hold that office with dignity and independence, Nasir Ajanah, paid with his life, un-mourned and exiled from the state. He was the second Chief Judge of the State to be politically lynched by the government of Kogi State in one decade.

Nigeria: When The Chief Justice Brings The Judiciary To Ridicule

 By Chidi Odinkalu

On February 27, 2024, Nigeria’s National Judicial Institute, NJI, in Abuja opened a continuing education course for judges. The opening featured an address by the Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN, Olukayode Ariwoola, who invited the participants to eschew “unethical conduct that could expose the judiciary to ridicule.” Beneath his text, it seemed as if the Chief Justice desired to warn the participants to stay away from interfering with a brief that he has chosen to make entirely his own. Under his watch, judicial appointments in Nigeria have become farcical.

*CJN Olukayode Ariwoola

 The fortnight before this address, it emerged that the CJN’s daughter-in-law, Oluwakemi, was at the top of a list of 12 nominees to fill judicial vacancies in the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, FCT. In the preceding six months, he had also appointed his son, Kayode Jr., as a judge of the Federal High Court; elevated his nephew, Lateef, to become a Justice of the Court of Appeal; and made his own blood brother, Adebayo, the auditor of the National Judicial Council, NJC, which he chairs in his capacity as the CJN. With this CJN’s retirement from office due on August 22, 2024, the concerted effort to anoint his daughter-in-law to the bench would presumably showcase his credentials for gender equity within his family. Let’s not digress though.