Opinion

IN DEFENCE OF THE DEFENSELESS JUDGES WHO ARE DOING THEIR JOB ACCORDING TO THE DICTATES OF THEIR CONSCIENCE

Published

3 months ago

October 27, 2024

By Achi. William-Wobodo

Being a judge, is a tough personal call to make. It is a highly demanding and ethical job to do, which makes a judge vulnerable and prone to bullying. A judge is trained to rise up in defence of the defenseless, yet he cannot defend himself. The rot in our society has made the job even more hazardous.

For every judgement that does not go in the way of public opinion and expectation, the judge is blamed and accused of corruption. This is unpatriotic. Judges are not employed to pander to public opinion. I am not in anyway suggesting that there are no corrupt judges in the system, but I honestly believe that the incorrupt ones are much more than the corrupt ones.

As we know it, Nigeria operates an adversarial legal system, which means that the parties are responsible for providing evidence upon which the court predicates its judgement. This is different from the inquisitorial system where the Court gets involved in the investigation of the facts of a case. Our legal system forbids a judge from applying extraneous facts in the determination of a case, except those brought before it by the parties in accordance with the law of evidence. In others words, even if a judge witnesses an event, he cannot apply his eye-witness account/evidence in his determination of the case. At best, he may recuse himself from such a case.

In the last few months, on account of THE POLITICAL CRISIS IN RIVERS STATE, Judges of the Federal High Court, especially, have come under serious public attacks and aspirations from some misinformed members of the public and MISCHIEVOUS LAWYERS, some of whom are either ignorant of courtroom practices and procedures or are indulging in clout chasing ventures. It is even more reprehensible and shameful when lawyers, who ought to have known better, are the ones indulging in such unethical and unprofessional conducts. These lawyers know that JUDGES HAVE NO RIGHT OF PUBLIC REPLY, yet they chose to castigate and cast aspersions on them; Most times, based on unsubstantiated allegations.

It is AN ACT OF COWARDICE TO CONTINUOUSLY ATTACK A DEFENSELESS PERSON.

LET ME EVEN CONSIDER TWO SCENARIOS FROM RIVERS STATE AS EXAMPLES.

In the wake of the crisis now rocking the Rivers State Government, between the Executive arm (the Governor) and Legislature arm; over the “alleged division” in the Rivers House of Assembly (RSHA) at the time. The Speaker of the RSHA (Rt. Hon. Martins Amaehwule) and the RSHA itself approached the Federal High Court for the determination of several questions, including: whether or not the “ALLEGED CRISIS/DIVISION IN RSHA” had crystallized to the point that the National Assembly (NASS) can takeover the functions of the RSHA pursuant to SECTION 11(4) of the 1999 Constitution, whether there was division in the RSHA, who was the authentic Speaker of the RSHA, etc.

Based upon which Rt.Hon. Amaehwule and the RSHA asked for declarations that Rt.Amehwule is the authentic Speaker of RSHA, that the crisis in RSHA did not warrant the NASS to takeover the functions of the RSHA, that the RSHA is entitled and empowered to make Appropriation Laws for Rivers State, including 2024 Appropriation Law, etc. Most of the Defendants in the case put up nominal appearance and defence in the matter, EXCEPT FOR the Governor of Rivers State and Rt. Hon. Edison Ehie (factional speaker at the time) who put up contest in the case.

Before or on the day fixed for the hearing of the case, Mr. Governor through his Counsel withdrew his Counter Affidavit/Defence (for reasons best known to the Governor and of course he is entitled to) and his Defence to the case was accordingly struck out. In same vein, Rt. Hon. Edison Ehie not only withdrew his own Counter Affidavit/Defence to the case, he presented a letter indicating his resignation as a Member of the RSHA. In other words, he also affirmed to the Court that he has lost his right, if any, to the claim of Speakership of the RSHA.

Invariably, there was NO CONTENDING DEFENCE to the case of Rt. Hon. Amaehwule and the RSHA. Justice Omotosho reviewed the evidence before him, which were DEEMED UNCHALLENGED and then reached conclusions and entered judgement for Rt.Hon. Amaehwule and RSHA to the effect that THERE WAS (IS) NO DIVISION in the RSHA, that Rt.Hon Amaehwule is the AUTHENTIC SPEAKER of the RSHA, that the RSHA led by Rt.Hon. Amaehwule is the rightful RSHA to make Appropriation Laws for Rivers State, that the Governor should present the 2024 Appropriation Bill before the appropriate RSHA.

It is important to mention that one of the issues raised by the Governor in his withdrawn Defence/Preliminary Objection was the fact that no Pre-Action Notice was served on the NASS before the action was commenced. Yes, the issue was jurisdictional in nature, but it a PROCEDURAL JURISDICTION ISSUE, not a substantive jurisdiction issue. The law is settled that a procedural jurisdiction question touching on non-service of pre-action notice can only be raised by the person directly affected, in that case NASS. The reason is because, the party concerned has an option to waive the right and proceed to defend the case against him without objection. The NASS took part in defense of the case.

In any case, the Governor withdrew his objection.

I have asked all those who fault the decision of Hon. Justice Omotosho in the media to point a finger to a fault, either in procedure or decision, in the judgement and I am yet to see o finger. Assuming anyone still had doubts about that judgement, the Court of Appeal had cleared the doubt.

The Governor who submitted to judgement by withdrawing his defence refused to obey the same judgement.

Not surprisingly, the Governor who in law is DEEMED TO HAVE CONSENTED TO THE CASE of Rt. Hon Martins Amaehwule before the Federal High Court, went to the Court of Appeal to challenge a JUDGEMENT OF FHC DEEMED TO HAVE BEEN ENTERED BY “HIS CONSENT”, WITHOUT THE LEAVE OF COURT to so do, contrary to SECTION 241(2)(c) of the 1999 CONSTITUTION and decided cases: See: ABDULKARIM VS. INCAR (NIG) LTD, (1992) LPELR-26(SC) (Pg.23-24, para D-A). The Governor also challenged the procedural jurisdiction of the Federal High Court predicated on non-service of pre-action notice on the NASS, a personal right of the NASS which was waived by the NASS by participating in the case without objection.

The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal for lacking in merit, and the Court is blamed; it is corrupt.

ANOTHER CASE: All People’s Party (APP) filed an action before the Federal High Court seeking a declaration that Rt. Hon. Amaehwule and 26 others have lost their seat. The APP commenced the action through an ORIGINATING SUMMONS, which is a procedure used for determination of non-contentious and non-hostile facts. Perhaps, the APP and its lawyers had expected an easy sail from Rt.Hon. Amaehwule and members of the RSHA. They are used to defection cases where the Defendants would say, “yes we defected because our party has dispute or division”: and then the court is called upon to interpret the admitted facts vis-a-vis the law.

They had expected Rt. Hon. Amaehwule and co to say we defected. Unfortunately, they met an unanticipated shocker, a brick wall; Rt.Hon. Amaehwule and co stated that they did not defect. A case which APP and it’s lawyers had thought would be heard based on non-contentious facts, had automatically become contentious and hostile by that singular denial.

The APP and it’s lawyers had three (3) options open to them by that material denial: (1) withdraw the case and file a fresh suit via Writ of Summons, (2) apply to the Court to order the parties to file pleadings, which would allow them to call oral evidence to prove the allegation of defection or (3) continue the case in its form with ruptured foundation and foreseeable pitfalls. They opted for number (3) and proceeded with their Originating Summons, then filed FURTHER AFFIDAVIT to which they ATTACHED A FLASH DRIVE that “allegedly” contained video clip of a certain defection.

The questions and challenges then arose: how and where does the court watch or see the content of the flash drive? ls it while in his chambers writing the judgement? If there is anything that needs clarification from the flash, who does he turn to in his chambers? Would he call the APP or its lawyers for explanation?

On realizing the procedural error, the APP still had an option of applying to that Court to convert the case by filing pleadings and to call oral evidence in order to resolve the allegation of defection, they did not. Rather, they pushed on with yet another and graver procedural error. The APP decided to play the video in the flash drive in open court, WITHOUT ANY WITNESS TO DEMONSTRATE THE VIDEO, TO IDENTIFY THOSE IN THE VIDEO OR WHERE THE “MOVIE” WAS SHOT, OR TO IDENTIFY THE MAKER OF THE MOVIE (VIDEO) (the CONTENT CREATOR). They pushed the procedural comedy and errors to a finish and left.

The the Judge was expected to perform a miracle, regularize the errors and grant them judgement.

Anyways, based on settled position of the law as decided by the apex Court, the Federal High Court Judge had no difficulties trashing and discarding the flash and its content as a piece of document dumped on the court. With that trashy piece of evidence made worthless by the inadvertence of counsel off the way, the Court was left with reviewing any other means of proof of membership of the said RSHA members, which should include, either APC membership register, PDP membership register, letter of resignation, etc. Unfortunately, these evidence were not before the Federal High Court. The Court therefore had no difficulty in reaching a finding that the APP did not prove defection.

As we now know, a judge, based on our adversarial legal system, cannot apply his residual knowledge of or any extraneous facts, not duly presented before him in accordance with the Law of Evidence, in the determination of any case before him. So, it remains immaterial if the judge’s wife was a camera person who made the “alleged” video or that the judge himself was in the chambers of RSHA on such a day or that he read or saw on news media any of the facts in contention. The law is that such facts MUST NOT ONLY BE BROUGHT BEFORE THE COURT, BUT ALSO IN LINE WITH THE EVIDENCE ACT, otherwise the judge cannot rely on them.

Sadly, we do not see the public blame lawyers, who either by inadvertence, overconfidence, indiscretion, desire for speedy trial, etc, destroy a hitherto actionable and legitimate cause of action and eventually their clients’ case. All we see are aspersions on Judges.

If non-lawyers feign ignorance of the workings of the Court, it may be justified and pardonable; but should same go for lawyers, who should haven better. Every lawyer knows when he has made a mistake in the prosecution of case, he is human who is prone to errors. If he is not courageous enough to own his mistakes, he should at least be honourable enough to keep quiet and not pass his blame by alleging corruption against the Judge.

It is a moral issue for both the lawyers and the litigants who cast aspersions on the courts. For instance, In 2023, the Court of Appeal, Abuja Division and the Supreme Court of Nigeria affirmed the Governor of Rivers State as the duly elected governor of Rivers States, the Governor organized thanksgivings, where he eulogized the Court of Appeal and Supreme Court Justices as men of honour and integrity. Those who lost took it in good faith and obeyed the orders of Courts.

At that time, no one heard the Governor make any insinuations of corruption against these courts. Few months afterwards, the Governor was ordered to present Rivers State Appropriation Bill to the RSHA recognized by the same Court that had recognized the Governor few months earlier, and what we now hear from SAME Governor who eulogized SAME Courts are insinuations of corruption against the courts. It seems hypocritical to me.

Litigants and lawyers must stop this act of casting aspersions on judges simply because the judges are not allowed by the ethics of their job to react. Should any one have proof of corruption against a judge, let him seek redress lawfully rather the public opprobrium. And for lawyers, whom I believe to be legal scholars in the college of continuing legal education, if anyone strongly feels that a decision of a court is wrong in law, and he cannot resort to appeal because he is not counsel in the matter, then such a lawyer can do a legal essay to query/critic decision based on acceptable legal review mechanisms, not by deploying blackmail and defamation.

Judges are human, they also have feelings and emotions which are bruised by these aspersions.

Please, SAY NO TO SOCIAL MEDIA BLACKMAIL, BULLYING, IRRITATION, ASPERSIONS on judges doing their legitimate jobs according to the dictates of their conscience. If they err or are corrupt, seek legitimate redress.

Achi. William-Wobodo
Lawyer writing from Port Harcourt

Related Topics:CONSCIENCE IN DEFENCE JUDGES

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Opinion

MEMORY LANE: West-Idahosa reflects on his earthly sojourn to commemorate birthday

Published

2 days ago

January 19, 2025

Austin Ojomah

By Dr. Ehiogie West-Idahosa, SAN.

By the Grace of God, I am one year older today. I was born on this day many years ago in St. Philomena’s Hospital, Benin City to Late Hon. Justice Joseph Oghogho Idahosa and late Mrs.Josphine Idahosa.

“I am grateful to God for His mercies and benevolence in my life. I have luckily navigated many dangerous moments in life by the Grace of Almighty God and the prayers of my families and friends. They include police shooting incident at ibadan as a young lawyer, nearly drowning in a big river, receiving middle voltage electricity shock as a child and a host of other mines that are daily encountered in life. I thank God for my ancestry. I thank my late parents for my education and upbringing. I am lucky to have an an extremely good wife and very wonderful children. I thank my brothers, sisters and extended family members for who they are. Very supportive people. I have wonderful friends all over Nigeria and beyond.

I have been lucky to be trusted by by different levels of the Nigerian society to serve in one capacity or the other. By the authority of others, I have served as Sanitary Prefect in Edo College, Benin City, Public relations officer of the Law Students Association, Uniben, Public relations officer of the students’ union, Uniben, branch secretary of Benin branch of NBA, Edo State Secretary of the defunct National Republican Convention (NRC), and thrice elected to the House Representatives, where I served Ovia Federal Constituency, Edo State and Nigeria to the best of my ability and energy. My sojourn in the House is known to many and they are the only persons who can write my testimonial.

I am grateful to Nigeria, Edo people and in particular, the wonderful constituents of Ovia Federal Constituency ( living and dead) for the opportunities given to me to serve them amongst so many ably qualified persons.

I enjoyed the good old Nigeria and hope that it can be recreated for the benefit of the majority of our country men and women. We had patriotic and well meaning leaders who were committed to good governance. They were industrious and nationalistic within the limits of available resources, knowledge, science and energy of that time. It has been tough for our country men and women in the last ten years or so.

But, the Tinubu regime seems to be willing to make big economic decisions in the hope of repositioning our national economy to serve all of us. Some of these decisions have been hurtful in many ways to the majority of our people as they were not incrementally implemented. But, these decisions would only be appreciated, if the dividends intended, begin to trickle down soon. This would mean more fiscal and monetary policy discipline on the part of government itself. There must be a cut on the cost of governance. There is too much of Holly wood life style on the part of public officials. The essence of governance is to serve the people, not to show off with public funds held in trust for the public. They are not personal funds and must be spent prudently for the good of all.

The fight against corruption must be made real. It must be carried out with a sense of equality before the law. As long as many remain untouchable by the law, the fight would remain cosmetic and negatively affect the quality of lives of all of us as funds made to develop our country would continue to vanish into thin air

The increased funding of the component states of Nigeria by Tinubu’s administration is good news indeed. It means that the governors can truly do extraordinary things for residents of the various states, as part of the renewed hope project. They have to noticeably decrease the ratio of infant and maternal mortality. They must work to provide more functional health care centers in urban and rural areas, pay real attention to education from primary to post secondary levels. Significantly, they must give new impetus to tecnical education. It is the way to go in the new world order. The state governments must commit to massive provision of infrastructure in key areas of the economy. They must take a good look at the need to generate more electricity in their states to boost economic development. They must venture into rail transportation. It is the easiest way to move people around in large numbers. It can be done. Lagos state is already leading the way. Others can do the same. It is a matter of exhibiting the requisite political will to do it.

State governments know the importance of security in their respective states. It is not enough to openly support the police with funds, it is equally important to set up covert informal intelligence networks across the states to provide information for the use of formal security apparatus in carrying their out functions.

Nigeria can be great again. It has the raw population, man power, presence in diaspora, sufficient elites in various spheres of life to drive the renaissance.

God bless Nigeria and best wishes to all of us.

Dr. Ehiogie West-Idahosa, SAN

Opinion

“Lessons on Leadership from the Nigerian Law Society (NLS): What the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) can Learn”

Published

2 days ago

January 19, 2025

Naijablitznews

By Dr. Tonye Clinton Jaja,
Executive Director,
Nigerian Law Society (NLS)

“We must forever conduct our struggle on the high plane of *dignity and discipline* .We must not allow our creative protest to degenerate into physical violence”
-Martin Luther King Jr.’s “I Have a Dream”,August 28, 1963.

The leadership (National Officers) and administrative staff (Executive Director, and ICT and Secretary) of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) have conducted themselves with utmost “dignity and discipline”.

The NLS “dignity and discipline” in the face of unrelenting attacks and illegal provocation by the Registrar-General of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) and the former President of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is something that students of Masters of Business Administration (MBA) are supposed to use as a case study of exemplary leadership and team work.

From the date December 2023, when a Federal High Court in Abuja gave a favourable judgment in favour of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) ordering the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC) to register the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) in compliance with Section 40 of the Nigerian Constitution, 1999 (as altered), it has been one attack after another.

The Registrar-General of the Corporate Affairs Commission (CAC), who is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) and who was supposed to apply legally approved methods, refused and resorted to extra-judicial methods such as publishing DEFAMATORY comments against the NLS on both social media and traditional newspapers.

In accordance with it’s principled “dignity and discipline”, the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) refused to respond in kind by engagingin a social media war. Instead, it submitted it’s complaints to the courts of law which were already handling the appeal filed by the same CAC and the NBA.

When these social media methods did not achieve the desired results, the Registrar-General of the CAC, then resorted to writing petitions against the NLS to law enforcement agencies such as the Department of State Security Services (DSS), Police and even the Nigerian Information Technology Development Agency (NITDA) requesting them to shut down the website and other operations of the NLS. NITDA is on record as refusing by telling the Registrar-General of the CAC that only a court of law can give an Order to that effect.

With their characteristic “dignity and discipline” the Executive Director of the NLS personally went to the DSS and Nigerian Police to respond by Submission of both written and oral evidence, to all these petitions by the Registrar-General of CAC.

Even though some members of the National Officers of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) also have connections within the Nigerian Police and other law enforcement agencies, and could have “unleashed” such law enforcement agencies upon the Registrar-General of the CAC, the NLS resisted the temptation of returning “fire-for-fire”. Instead they chose the path of “dignity and discipline” by reporting all these harassment to the courts of law and the National Human Rights Commission by a visit to the Executive Secretary.

They also paid a visit to the Hon. Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice to formally notify him of the illegal actions of the Registrar-General of the CAC.

All these foregoing, points to the maturity of the National officers of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS). This maturity cannot be attributed to only one person alone namely Mela Nunge, SAN, who currently serves as the President of the NLS. It is a result of the collective maturity displayed by all the National Officers of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS) who came on board sometime in July 2024.

It is not as if everything is smooth sailing or there are no challenges within the Nigerian Law Society (NLS), however they have managed to manage their egos and internal revolts internally without bringing it into the public domain.

To the contrary, the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) is recently embroiled in an internal revolt at it’s Rivers State branches that has now spilled into the public domain.

The crux of the matter is that the eight Chairpersons of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) branches wrote a letter to disassociate themselves from the decision of the headquarters of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) whom they accused of not caring them along as Local Organising Committee (LOC) in the forthcoming NBA national conference due to hold in Port Harcourt, Rivers State.

In opposition to the letter written by the said 8 Chairpersons of the NBA in Rivers State, another group of lawyers have written a disclaimer that the said 8 Chairpersons of the NBA branches of Rivers State do not represent the views of the majority of lawyers in Rivers State.

This recent crisis speaks volumes, it shows that the leadership style of the NBA is bereft of democratic ideals and lacks both the “dignity and discipline” and amicable dispute resolution methods that are the now the characteristic trademarks of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS).

Roll over NBA, welcome the Nigerian Law Society (NLS).

Perhaps it is time that the national officers, EXCO members of the headquarters of the NBA and all it’s chairpersons from the 218 NBA branches should attend a seminar on leadership style to be delivered by the national officers of the Nigerian Law Society (NLS)!!!!

Opinion

SOLUDO, OTTI AND PROSPECTS FOR TRUE NATIONAL INTEGRATION

Published

2 days ago

January 19, 2025

Kayode Sanni-Arewa

By Tunde Olusunle

Nigeria’s South East geopolitical zone has courted global notoriety for the multipronged crimes and criminality which has festered over the years. In several public engagements, I’ve had reason to comment on this lingering malaise which never seems to abate. First I wrote “Gunsmoke from the East,” published in The Guardian of August 9, 2021. I equally engaged the subject in “Unknown Gunmen, November 6 and the Epidemic of Bloodletting,” which appeared in The Cable of October 6, 2021. The needless hemorrhaging of precious, oftentimes innocent, definitively irreplaceable lives in the mould of day-to-day Nigerians, technocrats, businessmen, security personnel, cannot be more discomforting. “Travel advisories” emanating from the diplomatic outposts of several countries with nationals in Nigeria, typically classify the South East as a “no-go zone.” Reports from a few friends who spent the last yuletide in their eastern homeland, however, allude to a measure of sanity in the region within the season. Kidnappings were scantily recorded, killings barely reported. Let’s see how the minimisation of blood flow within the season, is sustained for our collective good.

As tribute to the innovations they were bringing to bear on governance and administration in their respective addresses, I had reason to salute governors Alex Otti of Abia, Chukwuma Soludo of Anambra and Mohammed Bago of Niger State in an overview I did last year. The piece was titled “Plaudits for Otti, Soludo and Bago,” and published in Thisday of May 24, 2024. I acknowledged Otti’s frugality and clear-headed focus on multisectoral development, as against the dour, colourless stint of Okezie Ikpeazu his predecessor. Soludo won me over for his determination to encourage and further deepen the development of homegrown competencies and products, while prosecuting an infrastructural makeover of Anambra State. Bago’s recourse to the conscientious development of agriculture in his infinitely blessed state, for local sufficiency and the economic sustenance of his constituents, remains remarkable.

Soludo and Otti are in the news again playing the roles of pan-Nigerian statesmen and helping to paper up the cracks of the edifice of our togetherness as a nation. The percentage parochialism which Nigeria witnessed during the ruinous eight years of Muhammadu Buhari at the helm of national politics and governance, was only comparable to the divisive rhetoric of Nigeria’s pre-civil war era. Buhari exhumed the fossils of our latent ethno-religious fault lines, intentionally imposing a Fulani hegemony on Nigeria to the consternation of the mass of his Nigerian constituents. He said in the early days of his administration, that sections of the country which gave him five percent of their votes, would reap similar measures in political appointments and project appropriation. Buhari made good his threat to a large extent. He punitively appointed Igbos to marginal ministries like Labour and Employment, as well as Science and Technology!

Early last year, Soludo appointed Joachim Achor and Adebayo Ojeyinka as Permanent Secretaries in the Civil Service of Anambra State. Achor is from Abia State, while Ojeyinka hails from Osun State. Ojeyinka by the way was engaged in the Anambra bureaucracy by the third republic governor of the state, Chukwuemeka Ezeife. Okwadike as Ezeife was famously adulated, led the state between January 1992 and November 1993. Ojeyinka grew through the ranks in the Anambra system, logging over three decades before his elevation last year. The process which produced him was merit-based. It included a computer-based examination, an engaging search process including security verification, and a one-on-one interaction with the governor.

Southwards from Awka, the Anambra State capital, Alex Otti of Abia State last week appointed Benson Ojeikere as the new Head of Service of the Abia State Civil Service. A little over 30 years ago, Ojeikere underwent the National Youth Service Corps, (NYSC) in Abia State. He emerged the best participant in the mandatory one-year exercise and was granted automatic employment by the incumbent regime at the time. It is a measure of his qualities and the implicit confidence reposed in him by successive administrations in Abia State, that Ojeikere’s brief before his recent elevation was that of Permanent Secretary in Government House, Umuahia. At Ojeikere’s inauguration, governor Otti re-echoed the sentiments of Soludo, his counterpart in Anambra State. He spoke of the imperative to “build a system where meritocracy triumphs over mediocrity, where the best and brightest can rise to the top, regardless of their ethnic backgrounds.”

This same pan-Nigerian vision, has successively informed the broad-arms embrace of Nigerians from all over into the scheme of governance in Lagos State, for example, over the years. Lai Mohammed, (Information Minister under the Buhari regime) from Kwara, and Rauf Aregbesola, (former Governor of Osun State and immediate past Minister for Interior), from Osun, savoured national political limelight under the Bola Tinubu governorship in Lagos, between 1999 and 2007. Dele Alake, (incumbent Minister for Solid Minerals); Opeyemi Bamidele, (Leader of the Senate), both from Ekiti, and Biodun Faleke, (a ranking member of the House of Representatives) who is primarily from Kogi State, are all alumni of the Tinubu “Lagos School.” Indeed, between Tinubu’s addresses as Governor of Lagos State and National Leader of the All Progressives Congress, (APC), his media advisers, Segun Ayobolu, Sunday Dare and Tunde Rahman, hail from Kogi, Oyo and Osun states.

If the sociocultural backgrounds of the above listed is unanimously Yoruba, if they bear etymological consangiunity with Lagos State, how about Ben Akabueze, who was commissioner for budget and economic planning under Tinubu in 2007 and thereafter Director-General of the Budget Office under Buhari? How about Joe Igbokwe, a serving Special Adviser to Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos? As Governor of Edo State, Adams Oshiomhole took along with him from the labour movement, Olaitan Oyerinde who served as his Principal Secretary. Sadl, Oyerinde was assassinated in May 2012, a matter which remains unresolved like most other murder cases in our country. All through his years as Governor of Bayelsa State, Henry Seriake Dickson had with him Francis Otah Agbo from Idomaland in Benue State, as one of his closest aides and confidants. Dickson indeed supported Agbo to vie for a seat in the House of Representatives which he won.

Between 1999 and 2007, Sheddy Ozoene from Enugu State was Chief Press Secretary to the Governor of Delta State, James Ibori. Back in 2003, Festus Adebayo from Ondo State, was Special Assistant, (Public Policy Analysis) to the Enugu State Governor at the time, Chimaroke Nnamani. As governor of Kaduna State, Nasir El Rufai had Adebisi Lawal, from Ogun State and Muyiwa Adekeye, from Kwara State as his advisers on Investment, and Media, respectively. Fausat Adebola Ibikunle, also from the Yoruba country was his Commissioner for Housing and Urban Development. Veteran journalist Bala Dan-Abu from Kogi State was spokesperson for the immediate past governor of Taraba State, Darius Ishaku. The foregoing discourse is apposite because it attests to the feasibility and sustainability of authentic integration in our socioculturally divergent polity, if intentionally prosecuted.

Except deployed for political mischief, except triggered by hard-line extremists, ethnicity and religion are barely divisive elements in our coexistence as a people. This reminds of a section of the lyrics of the song Me and You No Be Enemy, with the refrain “We Suppose to Be Family,” by Lagbaja, a post-Fela Anikulapo-Kuti Afrobeats legend. The song was released over two decades ago. Lagbaja’s treatise contends that if the colour of our tongues is the sole measure of our individual origins and backgrounds, humans from all over the world could all have evolved from the same biological roots! All tongues are red, Lagbaja reaffirms, while asking rhetorically what the distinguishing features would be, between a Nigerian and a Ghanaian; an Indian and a Pakistani; an English man and an American, if they stood in a file line.

By acknowledging and rewarding competence and merit as against sectionalism and parochialism in statecraft, Soludo and Otti have proven to us that we can together build a genuinely egalitarian country. We can draw from the diverse pool of human resource abundance available to us as a country to propel this country to greater heights at every level. Six Nigerians: Azeez Butali, Ijeoma Opara, Oluwatomi Akindele, Eno Ebong, Oluwasanmi Koyejo and Abidemi Ajiboye, medics, engineers and professors, were recently honoured by outgoing American President, Joe Biden. They received the Presidential Early Career Award for Scientists and Engineers, (PECASE). Their country of primary origin was not a parameter for measuring their intellectual and professional competencies, even as Biden’s successor, Donald Trump, once caustically categorised Nigeria as a shit hole country.

The colours of the skins and eyes of the Nigerians so acknowledged by Biden didn’t matter. The quality and value with they continue to avail to humanity was uppermost. Food for thought for leaders intent on imprinting landmarks on the aisles of time.

Tunde Olusunle, PhD, Fellow of the Association of Nigerian Authors, (FANA), teaches Creative Writing at the University of Abuja