Transition Monitoring Group (TMG) has expressed worry over efforts by some politicians to undermine fair hearing and judgment at election petition tribunals across the country.
In a statement by its chairman, Auwal Rafsanjani, yesterday, TMG specifically described the revelation that efforts were being made to subvert justice through bribery of justices and staff of courts, as revealed by the chairperson of Kano State Election Petition Tribunal, was worrisome.
According to Rafsanjani, while the action of the Kano tribunal chairperson in coming out to speak out must be commended, “one cannot hold back from imagining the amount of corruption that would have already trailed the tribunals across the country.
“It is even more disheartening to see that when democracy has become more threatened in the West African sub-region largely as a result of corrupt actions of some politicians, the need to tread even more carefully to ensure the judicial processes to addressing petitions from the 2023 election are seen to be fair, has been disregarded.”
Rafsanjani described the attempt to pervert justice at the election tribunals through corruption as an onslaught on the judiciary. He warned that if allowed to persist, it would further erode citizens’ trust in the judicial system to deliver justice, stressing that it was important to protect the judiciary from politics and corrupt politicians.
“At this point in time, when the outcome of the 2023 election has resulted in unprecedented number of cases before the courts, the judiciary has inevitably been positioned as the last bearer of the light of rule of law and has been left with the task of deepening democracy in Nigeria through fair hearing and impartial judgments.”
“While it is important for investigative journalism and civic activism to rise up to protect the judiciary from corrupt actions of politicians, it is also crucial for the judiciary to protect itself as an independent arm of government, by deploying every available legal provision within its means to ensure it is not allowed to be ridiculed by the politicians.”
The organisation, therefore, stressed the need for all institutions to ensure that democracy is not derailed in Nigeria by greedy and corrupt politicians.
