By Cally Ebue
By way of preamble, the concept of Layman in this write up is operationalised as anybody who is fortunate not to have wasted his precious time, energy and resources to study law as a profession and practice it in Nigeria, given the prevailing circumstances we are witnessing in the Third Arm Government.
Secondly, the decision of the PEPC to broadcast the judgement live, while the justices ab initio refused the same during the court proceedings is a great duplicity and subterfuge we laymen have witnessed recently in judicial proceedings. It is analogous to showing us one side of a coin and asking us to describe what the whole coin looks like. This is an insult on our collective intelligence.
The decision reminds me of the five blind men that lived in a little Indian village, who were asked to describe an elephant and each described it according to his perception.
Given the fact that we are all living witnesses to what transpired during the Presidential Election held on 25th February, 2023, we thought ” DANIEL” had come to judgement, but lo and behold , after wasted 13 hours, it turned out to be a choreographed judgement.
We saw the handiwork of the filthy and the debased mind of a retired female Supreme Court justice at play. The judgement confirmed the expo she had given us few days before the D Day.
After 13 hours of hoax , charade, and sanctimonious pretensions, the PEPC justices only succeeded in murdering and burying the spirit of the law completely. Even the so called letters of the law they relied so much on were seriously battered to the extent that a specialist in panel beating would find it difficult to piece the damage together.
Now let us navigate the web of the key elements in the judgement delivered by the five “Magi” of our time. Let us begin with the status of Abuja. The omniscient justices declared that Abuja should be regarded as one of the states of federation, that is the 37th State with no special status. Fair enough, that was a fantastic declaration. I love that.
But how do we go about that or implement the judgement on Abuja status? Number one, all the other 36 states have Governors, therefore, Abuja must equally have a Governor. Secondly, only Abuja has Minister of FCT, therefore, there should be an FCT Minister in each of the other 36 states. Thirdly, all the foreign missions and embassies located at Abuja, should equally be located in each of the other 36 states. Finally, there must be seat of government of federation Aso Rock in all the states to level up with Abuja status. Isn’t it interesting?
However, what the ignorant justices of PEPC did not know or knew but refused to acknowledge was that the framers of the constitution knew that Abuja is the melting point of all Nigerians and therefore gave it a special status equivalent to the Electoral College System in American constitution. It may interest the five “Magi” to know that during the Presidential Election in the United States, the first candidate to score 300 Electoral College votes, is declared the winner of the election irrespective of the outcome of the popular votes.
For example, in 2001 George Walker Bush, the 43rd President of United States defeated Al Gore after scoring 300 Electoral College votes even though Al Gore won the popular votes by more than 500,000 votes. The founding fathers of America were not stupid to have adopted the Electoral College System, just as the framers of our constitution were not stupid to have added the word “and”. But blinded by multi faceted evil considerations, the PEPC justices murdered sleep and they shall never sleep until justice is done.
On INEC’s transmission of results directly from polling units to IREV portal in real time using BVAS machines, the justices hid under the so called letters of the constitution and ruled that INEC is not under any obligation or compulsion to keep its words or promises to Nigerians. By implication, those justices sitting in the supposedly Temple of Justice now converted to Temple infamy, were telling Nigerians that obtaining by false pretence- OBT- 419 is no longer a crime.
Yet, about N300b of tax payers money, including mine, was wasted in acquiring BVAS machines and setting up the IREV PORTAL only to abandoned it at the eleventh hour and those justices gave them kudos for a job well done. From LAYMAN’S PERSPECTIVE, INEC was given the prerogative by the constitution to choose the method of transmitting the results, they on their own volition choose the transmission of the results directly from BVAS to IREV in real time, issued guidelines to that effect which they failed to follow. This was fraudulent and this is what the justices should have considered, because the prerogative given to them by constitution had already been fulfilled and overtaken by the choice they made. It was no longer a constitutional matter. Yet, the so called learned justices went on fishing expedition to excavate a constitutional provision INEC had already determined.
The most interesting aspect of the judgement was on the issue Tinubu’s drug forfeiture. No matter the euphemism they clothed matter, it cannot obliterate the fact that the President of Nigeria is a one time drug peddler. Cicero in his book “De Finibus” states that the laws place safety of all before the safety of individuals. They used every imaginable and unimaginable argument to give Tinubu a clean bill of health on the drug case. They felt short of not recommending him for sainthood on this matter.
Our youths are silently watching events as they unfold. Lord Acton reminded us that no authority has power to impose error, and if it resists the truth, the truth must be upheld until it is admitted.
Finally, when little children confused fantasy with reality, they do so harmlessly, and therefore due allowance is usually made, but when those who know better distort the truth that God had entrusted to them, whether deliberately or through negligence, far reaching consequences will be the result.
Cally Ebue
08033812109( [email protected]
