One Year Of Mukhtar’s Reforms

JUSTICE Aloma Mukhtar’s inauguration as the first female Chief Justice of Nigeria a year ago, passed without much fanfare because of her character, a quality she has brought to judicial reforms, particularly the sanctioning of judges.

Her appointment left her with the challenge of reforming an arm of government that bears its inadequacies with stoic embarrassment.

Corruption in the judiciary is barely punished. Justice Mukhtar has confronted corruption in the judiciary. She has led the National Judicial Council to punish it. The flood of 198 petitions that got to the NJC in one year, though Mukhtar said 150 of them were frivolous, could be an indication of peoples’ disappointments with the judiciary, as well as their expectation that Mukhtar would address the complaints.

Notable among the cases the NJC decided were those of Justice Charles Archibong of the Federal High Court and Justice T. D. Naron of High Court of Plateau State, who were retired for alleged unprofessional conduct.

The NJC on 26 April 2013, also suspended Justice Abubakar Talba from office for a year without pay over findings that he did not exercise discretion in sentencing Mr. John Yakubu Yusuf, who he convicted for stealing N1.3 billion from the police pension fund.

The N750, 000 fine, which Yakubu paid on the spot and gained his freedom, outraged the public.

Last week, six court workers were dismissed by the Federal Judicial Service Commission which Justice Mukhtar chairs, for leaking undelivered judgments for cash. Cases of 69 judges are awaiting the attention of the NJC.

Many applaud Mukhtar’s performance in just a year. However, more challenges lie ahead. She has to tackle them more expeditiously before her retirement in November 2014.

The most pressing of them is making the punishments for judges stiffer. Retirement of corrupt judges, with full benefits, and without recovery of their loot, is not adequate punishment that would deter others from embracing corruption.

In addition, corrupt judges and other judicial workers should be prosecuted. The odium of prosecution, with their offences made public, would be a bigger deterrent than retiring them. The current practice of the NJC, peopled with judges, trying their colleagues, does not provide adequate comfort to the public.

The other level of corruption, the exposure of undelivered judgement to litigants, deserves heavy punishment. The exposure of judgement is the precursory to bribing judges to reverse judgements. It is not enough to sack the judicial workers involved. What about those who paid for the judgement? They pose a greater danger to the judiciary. Do they not deserve punishment?

Justice Mukhtar has done well, but her performance has raised public expectation for more cleansing of the judiciary.