Ibrahim Khalil
29 February 2008
opinion
Kano — The story told by Ujudud Shariff in his Tuesday Column that appeared in Daily Trust newspaper issue of December 11 last year about citizen Bashir Abba Sheriff was not only pathetic and incomprehensible, but also scandalous.
It is even more scandalously revealing as the impunity involved is perpetrated by an administration that for good or for bad shouts itself hoarse as an offshoot from Sayyadina Umar's model; a model that epitomised nothing but absolute justice. To date, two months after that story, the government has not reasoned to improve on it.
At a time when the gospel of the rule of law, equity and due process is being imbibed by all democratic institutions and tendencies with judicial rulings being respected at all levels in a manner never in the recent past throughout the country, it is indeed incomprehensible that the Kano State government will defiantly refuse to comply with a judgment delivered by a high court since July 2002, a judgment that it had failed to upturn at Appeal Court level and therefore remains subsisting. If anything, the action or inaction of the government in Kano is both a fatal blow and denunciation to the democratic ideals that President Yar'Adua is bent on foisting in the conduct of public affairs all over the country.
Going by what is being said about this case in marketplaces, mosques, places of condolence and other socio-political gatherings, every patriotic citizen must be concerned about this injustice, the flagrant abuse of court decision and the level to which governance and public service have been reduced in Kano.
It suffices to mention a few of such concerns. Within the bureaucracy, reflections on this pathetic case leaves a gnawing feeling of insecurity among the civil servants that state agencies have now become mere instruments of power to silence, strangulate, denigrate or edge out focused and dedicated officers that certain powerful functionaries within the government are not comfortable with for reasons that have nothing to do with public interest or competence. This feeling has, most regrettably, reduced morale to its lowest ebb among civil servants as manifested in the confusion and other impunities that take over our environment for which the life of the Kano man has now become short and brutish, so to say.
Among public affairs commentators and human rights groups such as the Civil Liberties Organisation (CLO) and Basic Rights Action (BRA). It is wondered how a constitutional government could with impunity proclaim that it alone can decide which court judgment it would obey and which to ignore on the basis of "favourite at court or countryman at plough".
Among the victims of Pfizer drug test, the story is that of serious scepticism about the sincerity of the government in spearheading their case at the High Court. Should the government that refused to respect a judgment delivered by a High Court be trusted to champion their cause at the same court that it disparaged? They ask: is the government not politically toying with their fight in a bid to somewhat embolden itself rather than seeking justice and appropriate reprieve for them? What assurances have they that the government will not abandon them midstream? Perhaps, only time can tell.
Within the legal circle, the practitioners' concern is about how legal minds within the government and their mentors that survive by the law have decided to shy away from the law by willingly choosing to lose their voices when it mattered most. Astute legal practitioners argued that by purportedly retiring Malam Bashir Abba Sheriff the way it did, the government was rather too excessive in exercising the power that it does not have. They contend that legitimate and competent retiring authority in the civil service, for all intent and purposes, is vested in the civil service commission only and not the government, no matter how righteous it feels. Legal advisers to the government should have been sincere to both their profession and oath of office to caution that in this case, the government cannot approbate and reprobate, they added.
While I share these concerns, I am particularly concerned about citizen Sheriff, his children and entire family who must be wondering why a whole government, democratic government for that matter, should manipulate a simple and straightforward case to the extent of abusing the sanctity of their oath of office, our laws and institutions, the sensibilities of the populace and the tenets of proclaimed faith in order to inflict irreversible injury on them.
This manipulation of circumstances by certain top public officers specifically to pervert the course of justice must not only be condemned, but also deserves the severest moral, administrative and legal sanctions provided by the law. The government ought to know that where any citizen is wronged, there is always a legal remedy provided by the constitution, rule of law and natural justice. And recourse to such remedies as exemplified by Malam Bashir Abba Sheriff must be appreciated particularly as a patriotic duty against the enthronement of anarchy in the polity and, in the long run, in the best interest of the government itself and the civil servants.
The government should therefore be told that merely running in circle, which some high ranking officers appear to enjoy in this case, or dangling any diabolical offer that the purported "compulsory retirement" represents will in no way help its image laundering venture or performance index. On the contrary, it betrays a scenario of vindictiveness, lawlessness and double standard that spell doom for our socioeconomic development within the context of the Nigerian nation.
Although Ujudud had wanted to believe that Mallam Ibrahim Shekarau may even not be aware of this disturbing case, subsequent outcry about it must have by now been brought to his attention. He must, therefore call his "infallible officers" to order and do the right thing. Otherwise, when the chips are down, he will realise that he is on his own since the buck stops at his desk now. He must also realise that there is wisdom in respecting court judgments, as what goes around will surely come around. The refusal of the government to reinstate Mallam Bashir Abba Sheriff is a travesty of justice that should not have been contemplated in the first place.
Khalil wrote from Plot 1570, Ribadu Road, Kano.
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