An emergency meeting of the National Judicial Council (NJC) is holding at the three Arm Zone of the Presidential Villa in Abuja.
Journalists, who had gathered early enough to cover the meeting were barred from covering the event, but an insider confirmed that the meeting had begun and that the meeting was exclusively for members of the NJC.
This meeting is coming on the heels of the arrest of some judges by the Department of State Services (DSS) over allegations of misconduct and corruption.
The arrest has thrown up a lot of debate across sessions of the society.
Meanwhile, the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) has called the harassment and arrest of the judges absurd and unacceptable, but the Federal Government insisted that the ongoing trial was for judges alleged to be corrupt and not the entire judiciary as argued by the NBA.
This is perhaps the first time the Department of the State Service (DSS) will be making such sweeping arrests and some believe that this is a highjack of the responsibilities of the Nigerian Police Force.
Wednesday’s meeting by the NJC is expected to make pronouncement on the position of the body regarding the arrest of the High Court judges.
DSS explains arrests
After the arrest of the judges triggered series of comments from lawyers, the DSS, through its Spokesman, Abdullahi Garba, said that the service had in the past few days, embarked on raids of residents of some Judges of the Supreme, Appeal and High Courts.
Garba said that the operations were based on allegations of corruptions and other acts of professional misconduct by a few of the suspected Judges.
According to him, “the Service action is in line with its core mandate, as we have been monitoring the expensive and luxurious lifestyle of some of the Judges as well as complaints from the concerned public over judgment obtained fraudulently and on the basis of amounts of money paid.
“The judges involved were invited, upon which due diligence was exhibited and their premises searched.
“The searches have uncovered huge raw cash of various denominations, local and foreign currencies, with real estate worth several millions of Naira and documents affirming unholy acts by these Judges”.
The DSS spokesman further explained that some of the judges had made useful statements while a few declined even with the glaring evidences that were found against them in terms of material cash, documents and property recovered pointing to their compromise.
“In one of the states where the Service operations were conducted, credible intelligence revealed that the Judge had Two Million United States Dollars ($2,000,000 USD) stashed in his house.
“When he was approached for due search to be conducted, he in concert with the State Governor, mobilised thugs against the Service team.
“The team restrained itself in the face of unbridled provocative activities by those brought in by the Governor.
“Unfortunately, the Judge and Governor also engaged the tacit support of a sister security agency,” he said.
He did not state the name of the Governor and the state.
But the Rivers State Governor, Mr Nyesom Wike, had foiled the arrest of a judge in Port Harcourt.
.Channelstv
