THE Indigenous People of Biafra,
IPOB, has asked the Chief Judge of Federal High Court, Justice Abdul Kafarati,
to recuse himself from the proscription case of the group over alleged bias and
conflict of interest.
In a statement by its Publicity Secretary, Comrade Emma
Powerful, IPOB decried what it termed “the troubling absence of the presiding
judge, Justice Kafarati, in the hearing of the application for the dismissal of
the order he granted proscribing IPOB.” IPOB members at Federal High Court
According to IPOB, the judge granted “an illegal backyard order banning IPOB
activities but now the time has come for that order to be interrogated in an
open court” Justice Kafarati is absent ‘’from his own court so that the case
will not be heard.”
The statement read in part: “From a brief interface with
our lead counsel, Ifeanyi Ejiofor, within the premises of the Federal High
Court, Abuja on October 23, 2017, we observed with deep concern the manifest
case of perversion of justice by the AGF, acting in accord with the judiciary
of Nigeria, to sustain the unsustainable tag of terrorism against IPOB until
their illegality can find acceptability or justification in the eyes of the
public with the passage of time.
“The ex-parte order proscribing IPOB and
designating it as a terrorist group was applied for by the Federal Government
on August 20, 2017, and same was granted in chambers by the Acting Chief Judge
of the Federal High Court. “It should also be noted that hearing applications
in chambers connotes proceedings conducted with utmost secrecy without the
respondent (IPOB) present.
This procedure can only be used in limited
circumstance as it is a process widely regarded within legal circles as
inimical to cardinal principle of fair hearing.
“This order was granted barley
two days after the military authority unilaterally and illegally declared that
IPOB, is a ‘terrorist Group.’ This illegal declaration was promptly retracted
by Lt. Gen. Tukur Buratai following the criticism that trailed their
unconstitutional pronouncement. “It is expected that a senior judge and Acting
Chief Judge for that matter in the person of Justice Kafarati ought to be fully
aware of his October official engagements/undertakings at the time he gave a
date for the hearing of the IPOB application.
It is therefore baffling and most
troubling that Justice Kafarati did not sit on the day the matter was scheduled
for hearing, neither did his chambers communicate IPOB lawyers that the hearing
will not hold. “Going by the above unethical antecedents of both Justice
Kafarati, the Acting Chief Judge and AGF Abubakar Malami, the hearing was
deliberately fixed on a day Justice Kafarati knew he would be travelling
outside Nigeria for a one week seminar. “It is a known fact, even to the
unintelligent, that had Justice Kafarati sat on this matter on October 23,
2017, the application seeking the dismissal of the ex-parte order he granted
September 20, 2017, would have been granted, since same was not being
challenged by the Attorney-General of the Federation.
‘’The absence of any
legal representation from the office of the Attorney-General of the Federation
on the day this application was originally scheduled to be heard, being October
23, 2017, has more to it than meets the eye. Our advice remains that the Acting
Chief Judge should most humbly recuse himself from this case on the grounds of
manifest bias and conflict of interest.’’
No comments:
Post a Comment