At a recent symposium in Lagos on ‘Corruption in the Nigerian Judiciary’ the speakers persuasivelypresented facts and figures to amplify the popularly held opinion that Nigerian judges are probably the most corrupt group in the country. In truth, none of the speakers said anything new.

After all, some 6 years earlier, a survey by the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crimes (UNODC) and the National Bureau of Statistics NBS had revealed that “20 per cent of those who had contact with the Nigerian judiciary were confronted with a request for the payment of bribe.” A year later, the UNODC published another reportwith a focus on gender and corruption which statedthat “male judges are far more likely to be involved in bribe-seeking conduct than their female colleagues.”

The ‘question-time’ segment at the Lagos symposium was particularly exciting as the speakers referred copiously to disparaging remarks on the nation’s judiciary by senior lawyers and even retired judges who were in agreement that corruption amongst judicial officers had eroded public confidence in the judiciary and indeed the country’s justice delivery system. On its part, the media tends to believe that it would be difficult to find a Nigerian judge that is not corrupt. I disagree with the hypothesis. To start with, there is no empirical basis for such a sweeping statement. In addition, it is ethically unacceptable for the media to support any unproven generalization because one of its own ethical values is to maintain balance and objectivity by projecting with equal emphasis,all the sides to an issue.

Based on the above, we need to throw ample light on some Nigerian judges who amidst the stinking corruption in their sector have at one point or the other shown considerable evidence of uprightness while performing their duties. The main area of interest to look atwould certainly be election and political cases where many judges had because of materialism dropped the ball. With a good effort at dissecting even cases in that lucrative area, it is not really difficult to identifyand applaud some judges as I will show shortly from an overview of such cases. Starting from the interesting stories in Imo state where at a time the impeachment of deputy governors was in vogue, there were wonderful judges who stood their ground and kept democracy on-going in the state.

In 2018, the Imo State House of Assembly having been mobilized by the state governor to impeach his deputy, Eze Madumere swung into action; a hurriedly prepared list of gross misconduct was served on Madumere while the Chief Judge of the state also set up a panel to investigate the allegations against him. The embattled deputy governor rushed to the judiciary to stop the process whicha high court judge in Owerri, Justice Benjamin Iheka saw as meritorious. He then swiftly restrained 3 parties, namely: a) Paschal Nnadi the Chief Judge of the state, b) Acho Ihim, Speaker of the State House of Assembly and c) the State House of Assembly from taking any further action in the impeachment process until the hearing and determination of the suit.

Despite Iheka’s restraining order, the state assembly and the impeachment panel went ahead with the impeachment process in which 19 out of 27 members of the house purportedly impeached the deputy governor. Justice Iheka thereafter courageously nullified the impeachment and stopped the swearing-in of a new deputy governor. The judge also flayed his own Chief Judge as well as Militus Nlemadim, the commissioner for justice, for not adhering to the provisions of section 188(5) of the 1999 constitution on impeachment. That put paid to the fake event. Of course, Iheka could have been swayed by material benefits to allow the travesty but he did not. Whether or not the current judges in the same state can still display such uprightness is a different matter. The example of Iheka has howevershowed that there are still some decent judges in our clime.

Ondo State presents another scenario in which some judges prefer to lose the favour of a governor and his marauding ruling party than to pervert the cause of justice. Indeed, but for the judiciary, the present governor of Ondo state, Lucky Aiyedatiwa would have had his political career scuttled following attempts by some party chieftains in the state to impeach him as deputy governor. The state house of assembly had requested the state’s Chief Judge (CJ)Justice Olusegun Odusola to set up a panel to investigate allegations against the then embattled deputy governor with a view to impeaching him. But the CJ reportedly declined to do so in compliance with the order of an Abuja Federal High Court halting the impeachment process. This removed Aiyedatiwa’s impeachment steam but it is simplistic to imagine that Justice Odusola could not have acted differently like some other judgesusually did in some other states.

In addition, Odusola must have had at the back of his mind what a former CJ of the state, Justice Olaranwaju Akeredolu, had wisely done in the same circumstance in 2020. At that time,the State Assembly under the leadership of Speaker Bamidele Oloyelogun had arranged to impeach the then deputy governor, Agboola Ajayi.To ensure that justice was served Justice Akeredolu formally wrote to inform the Speakerthat the lawmakers had not completed the constitutional process that would lead the Speaker to invite her to set up an investigative panel as stipulated by the Constitution. She also took judicial notice of the fact that the matter of the impeachment of Ajayi had become subjudice. As an upright judge, Akeredolu held-on to the provisions of the constitution which compromised judges would have conveniently overlooked.

One reason local government elections are a shade worse than the poor general elections conducted by the Independent National Electoral Commission INEC is because all the members of a state electoral commission are usually friends, political associates and relations of the state governor. As a result, the conduct of a local election is always programmed for the ruling party to ‘sweep’ any local polls. It is usually so badly handled that every result would ordinarily have been nullified. But since it is a state affair in which almost everyone is in the governor’s pocket, not many judges can act professionally. Yet, Edo state had one Justice Alero Edodo-Eruagawho some years ago dared the state governor by nullifying the controversial Esan North East chairmanship election where a fake winner had been declared. 

What Eruaga did was to openly deprecate theillegal act of declaring a winner when votes cast in several areas had not been counted. She also frowned at the fact that the hurried declaration was made in Benin City instead of the premises of the Eguare Primary School Uromi the prescribed location for the conduct of the election. Accordingly, unlike what happens elsewhere, Eruaga courageously nullified the Esan local election which was clearly marred by several infractions. It is worthy of note that the judgment wasnot in favour of the state governor’s political partywhich could bring many dangerstothe judge’s way for doing what is right and thereby offending a governor.Justice Eruaga like her above listed colleagues in Imo and Ondo states can berecorded  among judges who were neither influenced by material benefits nor the discomfort that antidemocratic elements may inflict on upright judges.

This piece cannot exhaust the list of Judges that Nigerians should honour in their hearts, but we need to quicklyrecord the outstanding performances of two judges in Akwa Ibom state, Justices Agustine Odokwo and Bassey Nkanang. Election malpractices have remained unabated in our country because some of our judges are materially compromised to use technicality to let known electoral criminals off the hook. The duo of Odokwo and Nkanang are standing tall here for ensuring thattwo professors were sent to jail for election fraud.One of them, Ignatius Uduk, a professor at the University of Uyo (UNIUYO) was indicted for announcing and publishing false election resultswhile serving as the returning officer for Essien Udim State Constituency.

The other convict, Professor Peter Ogban a professor of soil science, at the same UNIUYO, was jailed for tampering with election results. He had been mandated to serve as returning officer for Akwa Ibom North-West District in the 2019 general elections. However, the issue today is not about professors but about upright judges who would be positively remembered by posterity for refusing to be compromised to subvert justice and heighten Nigeria’s unending experiences of failed elections. The Nigerian judiciary would remain indebted to them because it is through their performances that we can say with confidence that not every Nigerian judge is corrupt.