Justice And Its Price

Two young men were sentenced to nine months imprisonment in May for stealing two goats in Jos. The goats were worth a whooping eighteen thousand naira. They were sentenced by a Nigerian Judge.


In February, another young man was sentenced to just two months imprisonment for stealing Orbit chewing gum and packs of cereal worth four thousand naira. 


Yesterday, a 26year old man, was sentenced to DEATH by hanging for robbing a woman of a thousand, seven hundred and five naira and two rolls of milk worth a staggering sum of four hundred naira. Also sentenced by a Nigerian Judge.


I'm stupefied by the mode and manner with which Nigerian Judges descend on 'petty thieves'. Note that, in as much as I do not condone crime in any form, I find Nigeria peculiar. When an adult man steals a box of cereal, he's most likely just hungry and could really use a meal at that point in time. Its easy for most of us to say, hunger is not an excuse and that he's probably a lazy man thus cannot feed himself legitimately.  If you've seen, spoken and related with poverty in its rawest form, you will understand why a man in Nigeria will be pushed to the point of stealing a goat, cereal or packs of milk.


Marcus Aurelius posits that 'Poverty is the mother of crime'. First off, note that if you are reading this article from your iPad or smartphone, you are automatically excused if  you don't grasp the depth of that submission. You are by default, not poor. I thank God for you.


When they tell us 112million of our 160million live in abject poverty, they are not asking you to drive through Parkview Ikoyi or Asokoro Abuja, they are asking you to visit Makoko, Mbiama and Jirrgawa in Sokoto. Until you embark on an outreach to these areas and see firsthand what living daily in the slums and most rural areas entails, you will not understand why any man should steal a box of cereal.


In this same country, countless rogues prance around our corridors of power and get away with unimaginable fraud.


Justice Marcel Awokulehin is someone's father. In 2009, he acquitted James Ibori of grand larceny and we are told that verdict cost Ibori a paltry $5million. That same man is serving a jail sentence in London as we speak. Yet Awokulehin remains on the bench of Judges, doling out death sentences to boys who steal milk and goats. He even has the nerve to openly state that his conscience is clear. 


My Judges also hand out funny bail requirements to these 'small thieves'. I once read of a man accused of stealing fourteen thousand naira and had his bail set at two hundred thousand naira by the Judge. Amusing. Yet, Gbenga Daniel, who we fictitiously assume stole only fifty eight billion naira, had his own bail set at five hundred million naira. Of course OGD can afford that without flinching. As we speak, Nigerians languish in Kirikiri and Ikoyi Maximum Prisons for not being able to meet their bail requirements. I have it on firsthand information, that these bail sums are not millions of naira but as little as twenty five thousand naira. In this same country!


I have heard and read so many jokes about lawyers and their pathological lack of conscience but Nigerians take it to a new level. How dare any Judge sentence any Nigerian to jail for any form of stealing at all when everyday these same people are made victims of circumstance by their pilfering leaders.


 Any justice system that cannot prosecute, convict and incarcerate men like Peter Odili, Lucky Igbinedion, Gbenga Daniel, James Ibori, Erastus Akingbola, Alao Akala and so many others, has no moral justification to send a petty thief to jail. What is good for the duck must also be good for the drake!


I have had my personal encounters with corrupt Judges and I assure you there are only a few things more frustrating and disheartening. The thought that such men, custodians of life and justice, had price tags frightened me until I had that encounter. Then, I totally lost hope in Nigerian courts. Till date, a close relative of mine advises sagely 'Never appear before a court, whose Judge you have not 'seen' prior to court sitting'.


In any sane society, from the wildlife of Zambezi to the Kruger National Park, justice is sacred and is meted out without fear or favor. A society where justice is sold to the highest bidder is surely one on the path of implosion. Our Judges and their courts were said to be the last hope for the 'common man'. These days, a common man must be wary when he is summoned to appear before any court. You must first size up the financial biceps of your adversary. If their bank accounts are grandiose and yours diminutive, it may be wise to 'let God judge the matter' and hold thy peace.


To our learned Judges and legal custodians, we must implore them to ensure equity and fairness in any matter they preside over. They must exorcise and proactively banish the 'Nigerian' in them. They must remain above mortals in their ways as that is the gravity of the responsibility on their shoulders. They cannot afford to be compromised, if so, where then do we seek hope and redress?


A good elixir to the many bedeviling issues in Nigeria is a functional and vibrant judiciary. Our politicians are almost certain they'll find a Judge they can afford so they continue in their wanton embezzlement. When our courts put away a few of their friends and families for a few decades, the incoming ones will think twice before misappropriating.


'There is a higher court than the courts of justice and that is the court of conscience. It supercedes all other courts' - Mahatma Gandhi.


An apt parting advice for the legally corrupt learned ones.














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