KILL THE LAWYER BEFORE THE CRIMINAL

Story by Raising Adedeji Jimoh

The law is first of all a common sense matter, going by the general letters of the constitution. To this extent, the Constitution of Federal Republic of Nigeria gives allowance to individual for self-representation in court without the proxy of a lawyer, except in the case of fundamental human right abuse. Accordingly, must be understood that it is always the conspiratorial artifice of the Bar and Bench that often kills this value of common sense when they make recourse to ass of the law on the strength of perceivable lacuna in clause, phrase, word and even punctuation in body context of the constitution. When the Obedients set out to argue that Asiwaju Bola Ahmed Tinubu could not be adjudged winner of the 2023 presidential election because he did not win ¼ of the Abuja votes, it was the mere conjunction “and” that made the strength of their argument. And before you knew it, common sense interpretation of that word ‘and’ had almost began to create facts around their claim until the law made its own recourse to logic of the spirit behind the crafting of the referential word. As a matter of fact, the issue was one to defy the theory of Goebbesian principle that it is lies repeatedly flogged for a long time that makes the potential of becoming truth. This attained instant truth through the layman understanding of the conjunction ‘and’ to mean ‘inclusiveness’.

Imagine that situation coming at a time such electoral victory had been a case of transition from a ruling government to a victorious opposition party, or the incumbent President Muhammodu Buhari of the same ruling government of All Progressives Congress (APC) was keen, in cahoots with Adamu the Party Chairman, on invoking the xenophobic intrigues of some Nothern political elite at the time, I do not really think Nigeria would have been out of the constitutional crisis the ugly stunt of the Obedients would have thrown her into. That is how much the ubiquitous ‘certificated quackery’ in the law profession could be capable of destroying a country.

It is just unfortunate that this stunt of legal artifice for a parody of ‘constitutional crisis’ would come to find a place in the grassroots of Alimosho Local Government. It followed the eventual suspension of the Executive Chairman, Honourable Sulleimon Jelili, from office by the Lagos State House of Assembly “with immediate effect” and the Executive Vice Chairman, Honourable Akinpelu Johnson, was directed to take charge in consequence. It was to become an interesting game when the individuality of the suspended Chairman decided to take a fight to the institution of the State Assembly largely on premises of glaring sophistry and deliberate twist in the letters of the law perceivable by his limited knowledge of the law as a lawyer. After all, it is now a general knowledge that he holds a degree in law. But this limited knowledge would seem to go beyond him to include his counsel and cronies who, by common sense, one may presume to be goading him to the artifice of certificated quackery in the legal profession.

The upheaval this consequential tussle has created should be sufficient for me, and any other discernible minds resident in the Federal Constituency, to see a problem of existential imperative to address in it. This especially reckons with the oxymoron of deranged sanity – a case of seeming normal being with hidden insanity – that seemed to have trailed the needless crisis in some quarters. Or how else could one describe a piece by one Edafe Ogbenebrume whose vulgarity in uncontrolled flow of ink from uncultured mind would declare in blanket disrespect for the general constituents that “common sense is no longer common in Alimosho Federal Constituency”. This and other warped lines from similar minds have made the Jelili’s tact of counterforce in joining issues with the Assembly so far.

Ironically, in evaluation with open mind, this counterforce has been a mere grandstanding on slippery premises of acrobatic legal sophistry and irrational appeal to emotions. While the former could not and should not be deemed unnecessary for being a wrong opinion in the eyes of the law except when it flows into the bounds of mischief, the latter would appear to rather be more helpful in digging deeper the cause to seal the embattled Chairman’s fate of a goner. For instance, I do not know how a deliberate instigative call to the Executive arm et al to undermine the sovereignty of the State Assembly would help his case. That again made part of the gospel of Jelili’s cronies in reference. In the Edafe’s for example, he said in a somewhat ‘rider’ to the topic: “…And the Executive Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu, ALGON, Conference ’57 Executive Chairman, Conference ’57 Executive Vice Chairman and Conference ’57 Councillors shouldn’t Allow that Legislative Rascality to Stand…”

Further to that with incredible gusto, this crony even made the call with gross display of contempt for the Assembly, describing it as a body of “rascals” by implication – afterall, only the rascals can make “legislative rascality”.

After his rhetoric of preambles that attempted to make pretences to writing from apolitical perspective, his submission would eventually betray his partisan mind when he ended up spinning on the same legal sophistry that has been advanced for the nullity of Jelili’s suspension. “Since the National Assembly cannot suspend Governors, state house of assembly does not have the constitutional right to suspend elected council chairman”, he so submitted. Connected to this in part of the legal sophistry is the ubiquitous argument in twist of the fact that the Supreme Court pronouncement on financial autonomy for the local government is tantamount to holistic autonomy for the local government level. Unfortunately, none of these two premises hold any legal validity to help the cause of Jelili’s fate in any way.

In the preferential baying for the blood of lawyer to the criminal’s that make the topic of this piece, it is a metaphor for the ubiquitous tribe of the Obedients whose stock of trade is the artifice of turning logic on its head, especially in matters of law and it does not matter their level of education or professional pedigree. If the Obedient instinct of Chimamanda Adichie could irrationally distort her creative ingenuity and authorship creed of organised mind, it should be a matter of angst to see her scenario playing out with portentous breech of the community’s peace at the grassroots. For fact, none of the bases for Jelili’s legal counterforce to his suspension so far advanced by his camp is without ambiguity and equivocation. And I will substantiate my stand.

To begin with, the National Assembly through the Plenary Session of the Senate this past Wednesday – October 9, 2024 – had just harped on clarification of the Supreme Court judgment as purely financial autonomy distinct from the full autonomy. Interestingly, the statement of the Senate President went further to assert that as at today, the local government is never a third tier of government in Nigeria. Before quoting the Senate President, it should be trite to puncture the balloon of falsehoods in comparing the relationship between the Federal Government with the states of the federation as the two tiers of government we have to the relationship between the states and their respective local governments. This will help to address the circumlocution in the argument that the state assembly cannot suspend an elected council chairman because the national assembly cannot suspend a governor.

While the Lagos State Assembly had replied appropriately on point of law to the legal sophistry of the Jelili’s camp, one would not expect that the Edafe’s missive in reference would still want to flog the same issues on false grandstanding afterwards. Hence this clarity with backing evidence of the Senate’s position.

ALIMOSHO COUNCILORS BACK SUSPENSION OF SULEIMON JELILI To the extent that the Constitution places the local government under the direct supervision of the State Assembly, which is not applicable between the states and National Assembly, the local government is never any independent third tier of government in Nigeria. It is absolutely an appendage of the state, contrary to their argument. This is not the case with state and Federal Government, which are mutually exclusive in their independence from each other. It is a common knowledge that the National Assembly holds no any oversight functions over the component states.

To enhance and assertively establish the independence of state from the Federal Government, the latter cannot even unilaterally amend the constitution without the concurrent inputs of the states. Definitely, there is no such role for the local governments. Thus, inferentially, this is to say that in so far the local government is under the supervision of the State Assembly, the former is an appendage of the latter.

On the Supreme Court pronouncement, it is noteworthy that the Federal Government did not approach the court for declaration of autonomy for the local government. The pleading was single, simple, specific and direct to centre on the primary finance allocation to the local government from its source. This did not even take consideration for the purpose of Joint Account Allocation (JAC) as per section 162 and its relevant subsections, which speaks to the explicit mandate on the of the state to Make its own contribution to the finances of local government from the state’s Internally Generated Revenue (IGR).

Thus, the Court, not being Father Christmass, could only rule on the pleas before it – being the request to cause the release of due federal allocations directly to the owner local government beneficiary in this case. This rationally precluded any specific pronouncement on the local government existence yet being at mercy of state’s authority.

Making direct statements to clarify the Supreme Court judgment on the financial autonomy at the aforesaid Wednesday Plenary, the Senate President used the opportunity to speak on the current status of local government not being a third tier of government in Nigeria. He said: “We will ensure that local government funds are well utilised for the benefit of the rural people and at the same time, local governments are allowed to function and function well. That will also in due course include their elections…

“The 10th Senate, working with our colleagues in the House of Representatives, will alter any aspect of our constitution and amend any section of our laws to ensure full autonomy of the local government administrations in this country. We will ensure that local governments will be recognised fully in actions and in fact as a third tier of government of the federation”.

THE MISCONSTRUED POSITION OF GOVERNOR SANWO-OLU IN THE SUSPEHSION SAGA

I had concluded and made a bet over it that it was just a matter of time the political scavengers for crumbs in the corridors of power – parading as civil society coalition – would soon come out to discharge their paid duty on the issue. I had been vindicated accordingly with the news of their sitting yesterday and their declarative statement in the news morning.

Rising from their sitting, they reportedly lauded Sanwo-Olu for his “intervention”, purportedly in protecting Jelili from his due comeuppance the Assembly believed he deserved. That is a part of the dreadful deliberate misinformation and disinformation we are talking about – feeding the public half-truth information to garner needless empathy. To be sure and contrary to their misleading impression, the Governor has not done anything extraordinary nor anything untoward against the position of State Assembly on the matter. His call for a stay of action on implementation of the Assembly resolution was for the Executive to have its own basis for categorical position too and that goes beyond the individuality of the Governor.

Like the institution of the Assembly, the Executive is also a body of component representatives from across the state to make up the State Cabinet for collective decision making. It was therefore a cause for due process that the Governor would wish the matter be tabled before his own Executive Council for a collective decision too. That could not be on any date other than this coming Monday. That is even the reason the Constitution gives a span of seven working days for the Executive to make its official position in matters like this.

The Assembly that made the suspension to be “with immediate effect” and consequently ordered the Vice Chairman to take over was not wrong either. They realized that power abhors vacuum, so they had to act accordingly with that pronouncement.

To even appreciate the rationality behind Sanwo-Olu’s decision is to understand that the suspended Chairman had actually joined issues with the State Assembly in context of his inclusion of Ejigbadero’s matter as the basis of Assembly’s action. And to puncture this, the Assembly also swiftly responded by bringing to the open public the detailed malfeasance of the Council Chairman that had been investigated thus past. It is legally trite to address this holistically by the State Executive Council. It should not be the lowly individual Jelili that become the origin of conflict between the institutions of state assembly and the Executive.