Between judiciary and PDP

“I arrived here as early as 6am with other delegates from our state only to be told we could not go in. We are confused and do not know what is really happening.”
The above was how a delegate from Ebonyi State, Mary Onah, expressed her shock over the venue of the national convention of the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) which was sealed off by the police on Wednesday, August 17.
Onah was hardly alone in her perplexity. Her counterpart from Kano State, Mohammed Muntari, expressed similar sentiments, wondering why the convention that all efforts were put in to get things right would be scuttled.
Muntari said: “Honestly, I was taken aback when the police prevented us from entering the stadium. We will meet our party leaders to get more briefings on the situation and then know the way forward.”
The police, however, justified the seal off based on their knowledge of an order of court stopping the convention.
“Our actions are in line with court order; the time we moved in is not relevant. Police have been there and we are always everywhere.
“We are always providing security everywhere and it is our primary assignment to make sure everywhere in the state is well secured,” explained Francis Odesanya, the Rivers State police commissioner.
For now there is temporary peace while the tension created by the leaders of the PDP in the past few months simmers, giving room for the party’s minders to clear their heads of the fog that has saturated them and made it impossible for them to think aright.
The decision to have the Ahmed Makarfi National Caretaker Committee (NCC) lead the party for one year was not only far reaching but appears commendable as it will give room for all parties to think of how to deal with the myriad problems the PDP leaders created.
Critical decisions taken by the delegates after motions were moved and supported include:
• Dissolving the earlier agenda to conduct elections into offices to fill the vacuum orchestrated by the expiration of the tenure of the former National Working Committee members.
• Ratifying the NCC as constituted at the convention in Port Harcourt on May 21, 2016.
• Extending the tenure of the NCC ably led by Makarfi by 12 months, to enable the party resolve all pending legal issues in court.
• Increasing the number of the Caretaker Committee members from seven to 13 in order to cater for all the offices available in the NWC and include all the zones of the federation.
Indeed, not a few PDP members, nay delegates who were confident that moles had infiltrated the party and ready to sabotage its efforts at repositioning were worried that anything could have prevented them from meeting to elect their new leaders regardless of several court cases.
Delegates were cock sure all was well with arrangements in place for the event, and what was more, the reassurance they got from Convention Committee leaders that the court cases initiated by the Ali Modu Sheriff faction to scuttle the exercise was a charade that would not see the light of the day. How wrong they were!
What transpired in Port Harcourt on that fateful day, which left innocent party delegates stranded and confused, was the culmination of judicial rascality and inconsistency by two Federal High Courts, one in Port Harcourt and the other in Abuja; masterminded by selfish and conscienceless politicians.
Consider, for example, this statement credited to Sheriff: “When I was governor of Borno State, [Nyesom] Wike was busy carrying papers for [Rotimi] Amaechi. He is an amateur when it comes to national politics.
“Money will get you judgment, but truth will ‘abort’ two conventions. That is how powerful I can be.”
One event that preceded the botched repeat national convention slated for the Sharks Stadium was the emphatic ruling of Justice Ibrahim Watila of the Federal High Court Port, Harcourt on Tuesday, August 16, ratifying the PDP convention organised by the Makarfi NCC.
Watila ordered the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), the Department of Security Services (DSS), and the police to provide protection for the exercise in answer to application brought by the National Convention Planning Committee.
He took cognizance of his earlier ruling of July 7 that validated the May 21 national convention which was not voided by any appellate court and so was deemed valid and subsisting.
Unfortunately, a few hours to the convention, the now popular Justice Okon Abang of the Federal High Court in Abuja hearing Sheriff’s matter kicking against the Markafi committee, and holding claim to being the chairman of the PDP till 2018, barred the Port Harcourt event pending hearing of all substantive cases before him.
From the judicial processes in the PDP saga, and as it affects the judges handling the cases, what Nigerians are being served is a dish of cacophony of entrenched interests garnished with the canopy of the rule of law and supremacy of justice.
I really pity delegates like Onah and Muntari who were conned into coming to Port Harcourt by PDP leaders “confident” that court had okayed the event.
I refuse to agree that such PDP leaders are either politically naïve or completely ignorant of the workings of the judiciary. No.
A good number of them have played in the political arena for too long to know when a court order is inevitable. That is part of the stuff the PDP still needs to rid itself of, the knack to deceive members.
Often times one wonders if the judiciary is helping to grow or bring Nigeria down. When learned people as they call themselves slide into the arena of deliberate illiteracy due to failure to follow the tenets of the profession, it becomes a challenge to the larger society.
If truly we are dealing with learned people and judges in matters as complicated and contentious as the PDP and Sheriff’s cases, there should have been a ready guide in the Supreme Court.
Or are we saying that in the history of the apex court of the country, no such case(s) had come up before?
No doubt, Sheriff may be playing politics with the future of the PDP (I have written in this column that he is probably an undertaker to destroy the party), but beyond that, is it possible that he would realise his ambition without the connivance of some judicial officers?
When we talk about judicial reform in Nigeria we seem to approach it from peripheral pedestal, ignoring the substance and deep seated challenges that obscure the system.
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the judicial reform we tend to ignore is the excesses and foibles of the human capital that are part of the judicial system, and that explains the show of shame we often experience among some senior legal officers.
And as Martin Luther King Jr. once said, “our lives begin to end the day we become silent about the things that matter.”
The National Judicial Commission (NJC) must look into what had happened at the two Federal High Courts manned by Watila and Abang with regard to the festering PDP brouhaha.
The chief justice in his capacity as the chairman of NJC should, in this situation, understand that silence is submission, and can lead to bondage.
Nigerians have been made victims of wrong thinking and wrong believing about happenings in the judiciary, and if what Zane Baker says is a guide, “don’t allow the behaviour of others destroy your peace of mind” because there is no greater wealth in this world than peace of mind.