Raid and arrest of judges sad and deeply regrettable -Chief Justice of Nigeria, Mahmud Muhammed
Chief Justice of
Nigeria, CJN, Mahmud Mohammed has described the arrest and raids on homes of
some judges by Department of State Service, DSS as "saddening and deeply
regrettable"
The CJN stated this at
the valedictory session in honour of a retired Supreme Court Justice, Suleiman
Galadima, in Abuja on Monday..
"It is indeed very
saddened and deeply regrettable, the distressing and unfortunate incident which
occurred on Friday 7 October and Saturday 8 October 2016."
He urged Nigerians to
remain calm, saying that an emergency meeting of the National Judicial Council,
NJC, will take place today, during which the matter will be thoroughly looked
into.
"However, I must
appeal to all Nigerians to remain calm and prayerful, as an emergency meeting
of the National Judicial Council (NJC) will take place tomorrow [today]
to comprehensively look into the matter. I must express my sincere appreciation
to the executive of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) ably led by the
president, Abubakar Mahmoud, and indeed all members of the legal professions,
for their prompt action and continued support," he said.
Speaking at the event,
NBA President Abubakar Mahmoud insisted that President Muhammadu Buhari should
call the security agencies responsible for the arrest of the judges to order.
"We viewed these
actions as illegal and unconstitutional and a threat to the independence of the
judiciary and must be aimed at intimidating the judiciary and the legal
profession. These military style operations are totally unacceptable in a
democratic society. They are unacceptable against private citizens but even
more against serving justices of superior courts."
Mahmud said the NBA
rejected the explanations and justification by the presidency that the
operations were targeted at corruption and not the judiciary.
"We find it absurd
that the presidency will accept assurances from DSS that it followed due
process of the law. We maintain our position that these operations are illegal
and unconstitutional. I want to reiterate that the position of the NBA is not
aimed at protecting any judge. We are not also shielding any judges from
investigation from charges of corruption," he said.
Commenting on the
divisions among lawyers over the arrests and raids of the judges’ houses in the
middle of the night by masked armed men, he said:
"We do not accept
it. This portends real danger to the Nigerian democracy. It is contrary to all
civilised norms and accepted standards"
He advised the DSS to
restrict itself to its constitutional and statutory duties as according to him,
DSS core mandate is to guaranteeing internal national security.
"It is not its responsibility to conduct sting
operations on judges for corruption or professional misconduct in the middle
of the night," he said
No comments:
Post a Comment