It was Stephen Dorff, playing Sherrif Bill Hollister in the closing scene of episode 5 of the popular TV series, DEPUTY who said that “Justice isn’t just a word, it’s a consistent action on both sides of the law”. Justice Okon Abang came face-to-face with this statement, but only, the context and practicality of the situations were reversed. Whereas Sheriff Hollister made that statement following the triumph of law and justice over a deliberate abuse of sacred responsibilities and dereliction of duty, Okon Abang presided over a depressing negation of the action Hollister was alluding to.
His lordship, Justice Okon Abang, acknowledged the diligence of one part of the law, being the navy ship which carried out it’s constitutionally assigned role which is to police the territorial waters of Nigeria, apprehend oil thieves and confiscate whatever cargo they have stolen. He however, frowned at the other part of the law, depicted here by the federal prosecution team who compromised the entire case when it decided to connive with whatever powers behind the scene to water down the ironclad case it had against these thieves.
It didn’t end there, even the confiscated cargo could not be accounted for as a N200 million Naira worth of crude oil was purported to have been dumped for N17 million Naira. But the prosecution was not done stretching the boundaries of incredulity. In the words of Okon Abang “charges are amended to strengthen and enhance the case of the prosecution. But, I am seeing for the first time where a charge is amended to give the defendants soft landing”. The justice was reacting to the kangaroo plea bargain that the pirates were admitted to, enabling them to beat the death penalty, which is the provision of the law for piracy, with a paltry N2000 Naira fine.
It will be safe to say that Justice Okon has seen his fair share of incredulous cases in his career. You don’t climb all the way up to the high court bench without seeing these things, but there are some that simply standout in the scale of the absurd. Justice Abang fears that if he was to order an investigation into the shady circumstances that caused the prosecution to make a harsh of a straight forward case, ‘heads will roll”. Unfortunately, Okon Abang is certainly not, and will not be the last judge that will be confronted with such a travesty. Many justices of different layers of the Nigerian courts may have been confronted with one or more of such disturbing cases.
Disturbingly, Okon Abang’s experience is coming just months after a recording which allegedly featured an EFCC operative admonishing a suspect about ways of beating the charges leveled against him emerged. Before now, there has been allegations of deliberate sabotage on the part of EFCC prosecutors for instance, who deliberately tamper with their own evidence to allow the accused to walk free. It becomes even more painful when one considers first, the amount of our shared patrimony that was stolen by these thieves that are left off the hook, and the funds wasted pursuing such staged prosecutions.
Prosecution frauds like these no doubt give credence to the corrupt practices of some security agents who prefer to collude with criminals to enrich themselves instead of turning them in. Imagine if the Naval ship had cut themselves a deal, they could have saved taxpayers the funds used to prosecute – if one could refer to that charade as such – that sensibilities insulting case. Both pirates and Seamen would have lined up their pockets with lucre and none will be the wiser.
Okon Abang aside, it’s the learned silks of the bench that have always been on the receiving end of the public’s flack. The people have concluded that between judges and lawyers, there’s a conspiracy against the common man. Justice, it has been claimed is for the highest bidder and no one will say such claims are without their merits. However, it becomes overly disappointing when those paid to defend this nation and protect her interest turn around to start working in cahoots with our enemies to undermine our institutions. Without saying too much, weak systems will be the undoing of us all, including those who seem to believe they are beyond reproach right now
