By Solomon Bob
SEVERAL years ago, Philip L. Graham, former Washington Post publisher, famously said that journalism is the “first rough draft of history”. In 2015, following the election of Nyesom Wike as governor
Ostensibly working with a script provided by interested parties in the governorship election of 11 and 12 April, 2015, they pooh-poohed the evidence of their own eyes and unleashed an implausible media overdrive which ridiculed the election by claiming that it did not, well, take place!
Their invented version of reality ran counter to every grain of fact on the ground and, more importantly, the electoral umpire’s own version. INEC had persistently and untiringly refuted sponsored media attempt to delegitimize the election through the psychedelic presentation of what has become known in recent lingo popularized by White House spokesman, Sean Spicer, as “alternative facts”.
Then INEC chair, Prof. Attahiru Jega, had issued statement after statement reiterating the validity of the election as being free and fair and reflecting the choice of the people of Rivers State. But a well-briefed horde of media hands on a self-serving mission couldn’t be outdone, and instead doubled down on its own version of reality which, unfortunately, largely shaped public opinion as many, if not most people, outside the shores of Rivers State began to believe the lie.
Undoubtedly preying on these unfounded sentiments and totally against the grain of evidence led before it, the Rivers State Governorship Election Tribunal (which was unjustifiably hurled to Abuja), on 31 October, 2015, made the astonishing decision to annul the election of Governor Wike, describing it as “a mockery of democracy”.
The Tribunal’s above quoted words sent the media drooling but no attempt was made to interrogate how it came to that conclusion. Then on 5 September, 2015, the Court of Appeal followed suit by affirming the Tribunal’s judgment. To discerning observers of both proceedings the feeling was one of utter shock and disbelief.
But a more shocking development with far-reaching ramifications had transpired before the tribunal: the chairman had been peremptorily sacked mid-way.
His replacement immediately set about delivering rulings on key applications which he never heard. Those applications had challenged the very competency of the petition and the jurisdiction of the Tribunal to hear it. As the Supreme Court would later hold, even on this score alone, the entire proceeding before the Tribunal was a nullity, an exercise in futility.
But how did a simple matter of fair hearing – a principle at the heart of our jurisprudence – escape the Court of Appeal’s microscope? And how did such an extraordinary and telling abuse of the judicial process not hug the headlines?
Fortunately, however, on 27 January, 2016, the Supreme Court, in a stirring and brave judgment, overruled the concurrent decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal.
It was a brave judgment not because the judgment broke any new legal grounds. Nor because of the erroneous conclusion that the Supreme Court was bound to uphold the concurrent findings of fact by two lower courts however perverse.
Indeed, the reverse is the case as the court re-stated the principle that it would, in fact, interfere with the concurrent findings of fact by two lower courts where “the findings are perverse”. [Saleh v B.O.N Ltd (2006) 6 NWLR (pt. 976) at p.316]; [Agbaje v Fashola (2008) 6 NWLR (pt. 1082) at 90].
And ‘findings’ don’t come more perverse and absurd than the decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal in Wike’s case.
Rather, the judgment of the Supreme Court was a brave one for the simple reason that, perhaps, no election petition in the annals of Nigerian judicial history had been so laden with such extraordinary and brazen political intrigue from the highest quarters in the land. So intense and palpable was the pressure on the court to give judgment one way regardless of the tide of evidence before it that most observers concluded that it was fait accompli only awaiting a formal endorsement.
Anyone would have pardoned such despair who witnessed the egregious miscarriage of justice perpetrated in the lower courts, and listened to the unrelenting drumbeat of obfuscation and disinformation that emanated daily from the media at the time.
It has to be said, however, that despite the orchestrated media hoopla and the hired commentary of otherwise well-informed legal minds, every lawyer and his dog knew that the decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal were against a long line of judicial precedent established by the Supreme Court.
Nonetheless, that was the insalubrious extraneous headwind against which the Supreme Court battled and re-asserted the independence of the judiciary by sticking with the fine principles of the law.
To be continued… search this blog for continuation
We give all for Benefits...
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| Gov. Nyesom Wike and Dakuku Peterside |
of Rivers State, Nigerian journalists took Graham’s words literally and attempted to write their own bit of history on false drafts.
Ostensibly working with a script provided by interested parties in the governorship election of 11 and 12 April, 2015, they pooh-poohed the evidence of their own eyes and unleashed an implausible media overdrive which ridiculed the election by claiming that it did not, well, take place!
Their invented version of reality ran counter to every grain of fact on the ground and, more importantly, the electoral umpire’s own version. INEC had persistently and untiringly refuted sponsored media attempt to delegitimize the election through the psychedelic presentation of what has become known in recent lingo popularized by White House spokesman, Sean Spicer, as “alternative facts”.
Then INEC chair, Prof. Attahiru Jega, had issued statement after statement reiterating the validity of the election as being free and fair and reflecting the choice of the people of Rivers State. But a well-briefed horde of media hands on a self-serving mission couldn’t be outdone, and instead doubled down on its own version of reality which, unfortunately, largely shaped public opinion as many, if not most people, outside the shores of Rivers State began to believe the lie.
Undoubtedly preying on these unfounded sentiments and totally against the grain of evidence led before it, the Rivers State Governorship Election Tribunal (which was unjustifiably hurled to Abuja), on 31 October, 2015, made the astonishing decision to annul the election of Governor Wike, describing it as “a mockery of democracy”.
The Tribunal’s above quoted words sent the media drooling but no attempt was made to interrogate how it came to that conclusion. Then on 5 September, 2015, the Court of Appeal followed suit by affirming the Tribunal’s judgment. To discerning observers of both proceedings the feeling was one of utter shock and disbelief.
But a more shocking development with far-reaching ramifications had transpired before the tribunal: the chairman had been peremptorily sacked mid-way.
His replacement immediately set about delivering rulings on key applications which he never heard. Those applications had challenged the very competency of the petition and the jurisdiction of the Tribunal to hear it. As the Supreme Court would later hold, even on this score alone, the entire proceeding before the Tribunal was a nullity, an exercise in futility.
But how did a simple matter of fair hearing – a principle at the heart of our jurisprudence – escape the Court of Appeal’s microscope? And how did such an extraordinary and telling abuse of the judicial process not hug the headlines?
Fortunately, however, on 27 January, 2016, the Supreme Court, in a stirring and brave judgment, overruled the concurrent decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal.
It was a brave judgment not because the judgment broke any new legal grounds. Nor because of the erroneous conclusion that the Supreme Court was bound to uphold the concurrent findings of fact by two lower courts however perverse.
Indeed, the reverse is the case as the court re-stated the principle that it would, in fact, interfere with the concurrent findings of fact by two lower courts where “the findings are perverse”. [Saleh v B.O.N Ltd (2006) 6 NWLR (pt. 976) at p.316]; [Agbaje v Fashola (2008) 6 NWLR (pt. 1082) at 90].
And ‘findings’ don’t come more perverse and absurd than the decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal in Wike’s case.
Rather, the judgment of the Supreme Court was a brave one for the simple reason that, perhaps, no election petition in the annals of Nigerian judicial history had been so laden with such extraordinary and brazen political intrigue from the highest quarters in the land. So intense and palpable was the pressure on the court to give judgment one way regardless of the tide of evidence before it that most observers concluded that it was fait accompli only awaiting a formal endorsement.
Anyone would have pardoned such despair who witnessed the egregious miscarriage of justice perpetrated in the lower courts, and listened to the unrelenting drumbeat of obfuscation and disinformation that emanated daily from the media at the time.
It has to be said, however, that despite the orchestrated media hoopla and the hired commentary of otherwise well-informed legal minds, every lawyer and his dog knew that the decisions of the Tribunal and the Court of Appeal were against a long line of judicial precedent established by the Supreme Court.
Nonetheless, that was the insalubrious extraneous headwind against which the Supreme Court battled and re-asserted the independence of the judiciary by sticking with the fine principles of the law.
To be continued… search this blog for continuation
We give all for Benefits...
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