Legal Updates

HERALDING A TRUE LEADER: MONDAY, ONYEKACHI UBANI (MOU)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY.

Published

10 months ago

July 26, 2023

Stella Charles Akupue

HERALDING A TRUE LEADER: MONDAY, ONYEKACHI UBANI (MOU)

I appreciate the promptness of our President, Mr Yakubu Maikyau SAN, in reacting to the show of shame at the Federal High Court, Lagos, by the officers of DSS yesterday.

Our judiciary and its powers are being undermined by such a lawless and senseless display of power by the officers of DSS at the court premises. The legal profession cannot afford to be silent when lawless government officials threaten or destroy everything about it. It is dangerous!

The court’s order was explicit on who should take custody of the Defendant, in this case, Mr Emefiele, former Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria. It is appaling that DSS, which had him for over a month, was eager to take him back into custody despite the express order of the court.

What more offence/s do they desire to investigate, which they did not complete for over one month they had him in their custody? Were they not the ones that came up with the miserable charge of illegally possessing firearms after his lengthy detention?

It is now they want to investigate the alleged funding of terrorism? We joke too much in this country!

Who actually should be blamed in the circumstance, DSS or Correctional Centre?
Suppose we consider that before yesterday, several court orders directed the release or arraignment of Mr Emefiele, which were observed in the breach by DSS.

In that case, we cannot but lay appropriate blame on the doorstep of the culprit, which is DSS. No prevarications, gentlemen!

HERALDING A TRUE LEADER: MONDAY, ONYEKACHI UBANI (MOU)

The attitude and exercise of power by DSS under this new dispensation need to be interrogated. Their penchant and impunity in disobeying court orders need the bold condemnation of the Nigerian Bar Association to nip their contempt for the rule of law in the bud. We do not need to patronise them as they are hell-bent on destroying the rule of law and, by extension, have won democracy.

I believe President Tinubu’s government owe Nigerians the onerous responsibility to toe the line of the rule of law and obedience to court orders under his government.

If he chooses to go the way of other regimes in Nigeria, let him rest assured that patriotic-minded Nigerians will resist him and his planned autocratic rule. The citizens have suffered enough and are ready to take their destinies into their hands this time. A word is enough.