Mohammed Adoke: another Nigerian irony
The year 2019 is destined to end as it started - a big ironical casualty in the legal profession. It started with the dramatic fall from grace of Walter Onoghen, the then Chief Justice of Nigeria. And it ends with the arrest and detention of Mohammed Adoke, former Attorney General of Nigeria, by interpol in Dubai for one month, and his eventual extradition to Nigeria, followed by arrest at the airport by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission.
What the stories of Onoghen and Adoke have in common is not only the fact that they share the theme of an elephant that ended up in a rabbit cage. The respective stories of the two men reflect the peculiarity of the Nigerian society.
Both Onoghen and Adoke will claim to be victims of an unjust and unfair legal and judicial systems. But both had opportunities to make the same legal and judicial systems fairer and more just. And both failed largely to do so. They thus ended up victims of their own negligence.
This is not the first time we see such victims of self in Nigeria. Indeed, they are abundant in Nigeria. Abba Moro was the Minister of Interior before he ended up remanded in Kuje prison. The inmates and the warders, upon sighting him, were very happy to welcome him to the type of prison he wanted for Nigeria while he was the Minister in Charge of prisons. At that moment, he wished he had reformed the prison system when he had the opportunity. Tafa Balogun, a former Inspector General of Police, was brutalized by junior police officers using the same brutality tactics that Tafa Balogun allowed when he was the head of the police force.
Orji Uzor Kalu and other ex-Governors are in prison at the moment. Senators, Ministers and even serving Governors go to visit them in prison. They are all lamenting privately the unjust legal system. Yet, none is doing anything to change the situation for the future. The lesson is clear. True leaders should seek to better the future. But our leaders only seek to better the past, which is impossible. We wish Mohammed Adoke peaceful enjoyment of the system of criminal justice he wished for others.