I DID ask in my last piece whether the Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN, Justice Katsina-Alu, is above the law. I ask because, for me, while respect for the office of the CJN should remain sacrosanct, men or women who occupy this exalted office must be subjected to critical scrutiny. This is crucial in order to prevent their personality traits from bringing infamy to this highly revered office.

But I have raised this question about this seeming untouchability of the CJN because not many writers on this unprecedented judicial shame have told the CJN, Katsina-Alu, some hard truth and in the most crystal language. And I think we owe this nation and posterity a solemn duty to tell our leaders, sometimes-turned-oppressors, the truth so that history will not crucify us for criminal indifference. That hard truth is that the CJN has become perhaps the most controversial, confrontational and indeed combative Chief Justice of Nigeria in recent memory, if not all time. I will return to this.

Let me start with the instant case. What has now spiraled into an enactment and re-enactment of a farcical and honour-less judiciary would never have arisen but for the CJN’s penetrative interest in the activities of the Sokoto Appeal Panel. Let us look at the convoluted beginning of this rat race.

Manipulation by powerful forces

What has today become a barbaric judicial fight of history had its landmines laid out by the Sokoto Governorship Tribunal that gave a bizarre judgement in the petition of Muhammadu Maigari Dingyadi of the Democratic Peoples Party, DPP, challenging the election of Alhaji Aliyu Wammako of the Peoples Democratic Party, PDP. This panel annulled the election of Wammako for the sole reason that he was not qualified to run for the election. Yet, the same panel created an incongruous leeway that gave the same disqualified Wammako an opportunity to participate in the re-run election. That a man deemed unfit and unqualified ran in the re-run election showed clearly that mega judicial powers were already at play. Wammako was ‘ordained’ to win. And Dingyadi was fated to return to the courts. The seed for a judicial shame had been sown. And it was on a fertile ground.

That cjn’s interest in security

Katsina-Alu is blessed with the reticent poise and persona of a quintessential CJN. You hardly hear his voice. What you see is his stealthy action. But he sadly falls literally within the category of those great men who, though so rich, can’t afford the price of peace even when it comes so cheap.

The CJN admitted he invited the PCA to his office on February 8, 2010. But he claimed their discussion centered on the then pending judgement of the Appeal Panel of the Sokoto state governorship election which was alleged to have leaked. But the PCA claimed that nothing was mentioned about leaked judgement.

On the contrary, he revealed that the CJN asked him to instruct the Appeal panel to give judgement in favour of the sitting governor, Wammako. He added that the CJN stated that if the governor was removed, there could be security issues as the new governor may depose a powerful traditional ruler in the state.

Salami rejected the CJN’s alleged instruction or perhaps order according to him and so a battle line was drawn. The only person present at the meeting, Justice Dahiru Musdapher, corroborated the CJN’s ‘’leaked judgement’’ theory but also confessed that the CJN talked about security breach which, so to say, also authenticated part of Salami’s claim.

Now, the question that came to my mind as I tried to unravel this intricate scenario is, how is it that the CJN did not set up a panel to investigate the alleged leakage of this judgement , at least to confirm it leaked? And if the leakage was so glaring, how is it that it didn’t get to the ever-flexed ears of judicial correspondents? More seriously, what business does the CJN or the judiciary have to do with security? Why was the CJN so concerned about security breach? Is his office an extension of the State Security Service or the police? That Justice Musdapher re-echoed this security subject at all, even if barely mooted, should have helped the panel to detect who was a despicable liar in this case.

If Katsina-Alu appreciated deeply the lofty stature of his office and indeed the reverence attached to it, he probably would have left Salami and his men at the Appeal panel to continue with their job because he had obviously betrayed more than a cursory interest in the Sokoto matter.

But the CJN apparently underestimated the PCA’s inflexibility over what he believes right. And so he fired him a query. The PCA replied with a fiery tone accusing the CJN of undue interference. Not one to dread the battle field, Katsina-Alu in response sat in his apex court and unleashed an imperial decree that stopped the Sokoto Appeal panel from delivering the judgement of a suit that was not before his court.

For many, the CJN’s action was the height of judicial rascality. But the Benue indigene was not done yet. His retirement was due on August 29, 2011, but for him, Salami must be ousted and possibly routed before he makes his exit that would certainly come without any ovation except from some unctuous characters.

If the CJN had not placed himself on a monstrous pedestal where he had to fight a most ignominous battle against the PCA and the NBA, he probably would have proceeded on leave one month to his final date in office. But no, he would have to battle on like the fated soldiers of the Nazi Third Reich. His next action would spur a controversy that would open the judiciary for denigration, if not desecration.

The judiciary finally exposed the naked and pedestrian politics that it was now enmeshed when the Federal Judicial Service Commission headed by Katsina-Alu as the CJN attempted to promote Salami to the Supreme Court against his wish. It was simply a cheap plan by the CJN to judicially castrate the PCA and because Salami knew this, he went to court to stop this pseudo promotion.

Complicity of the njc

The NJC had intervened earlier in the feud and set up a panel headed by a respected retired Justice of the Supreme Court and included three other retired Justices of the apex court and a retired former President of the Appeal Court. This panel found Salami blameless in all his conducts and indicted Katsina-Alu of judicial recklessness as the five-man body stated unequivocally that the CJN had no powers whatsoever to interfere in any proceeding that was not before his court.

If the NJC was not playing out a well rehearsed script, the issue of setting up the Umaru Abdullahi led panel would not have arisen as a panel of men of distinction had already done the job.

Worse still, the third panel headed by Justice Auta is simply ridiculous as a junior judge made a recommendation with the sadistic intention to make his superior suffer self-immolation by asking the PCA to tender apologies in writing to the CJN and the NJC.

Both the Auta panel and the NJC know Salami to be a man of absolute integrity. They knew he would not apologise and pronto the NJC suspended him and recommended his retirement to the President. But what could Nigerians have expected from an NJC where 80 percent of the members are solely appointed by the CJN. Sadly, President Jonathan allowed himself to be dragged into this absurdity, putting a very huge question mark on his neutrality.

Mr. Zik Zulu Okafor, an award winning journalist and scholar, wrote from Lagos