A coalition of over 50 non-governmental organisations (NGOs) has given the National Judicial Council (NJC) a one-week ultimatum to suspend all the judges arrested by the Department of State Service (DSS) over allegations of corrupt practices.
Members of the organisation in their large numbers, stormed the Supreme Court and National Assembly Complexes in Abuja asking all judges arrested by the DSS to step aside pending the outcome of their trials in court.
The protesters under the Forum of Non-Governmental Organisations in Nigeria (FONGON) carried placards with various inscriptions reading: “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,” among others.
Addressing the media, Chairman of the Forum, Comrade Wole Badmus, decried the fact that the security operatives refused to grant the protesters access to the Supreme Court, saying that the group had already articulated its demands in a letter to the NJC.
He accused the council of being double-faced by refusing to suspend the arrested judges, noting that NJC had, in the past, suspended some judges for offences less grievous than what “this crop of judges is being accused of.”
According to him, the coalition would disrupt activities of the judiciary arm of government in various courts if the NJC fails to suspend the arrested judges so they can step aside and face prosecution.
Badmus, who said the Commission’s refusal to act appropriately would only serve to encourage corruption in the judiciary, noted: “Judicial corruption is worse than economic corruption. A judge that frees a corrupt person or a thief after being compromised is only asking the thief to go and continue stealing.
“From year 2000 till date, about 73 judges have been suspended by the NJC but none of them has been prosecuted all these years, what kind of double standard is this?”
He insisted that it was wrong for the NJC to defend the embattled judges when in the past it had had cause to remove other judges pending the conclusion of investigations into allegations of corruption leveled against them.
