VP Osinbajo’s Address At The Justice Research Institute’s Law & Policy Research Event On 08/08/2020

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REMARKS BY HIS EXCELLENCY, PROF. YEMI OSINBAJO, SAN, GCON, VICE PRESIDENT OF THE FEDERAL REPUBLIC OF NIGERIA AT THE JUSTICE RESEARCH INSTITUTE’S LAW & POLICY RESEARCH EVENT ON THE 8^TH OF AUGUST, 2020

I’d like to thank the Justice Research Institute for inviting me to participate in this crucial conversation. Of course, I am very much a part of the Institute and I’m happy that they remembered me.

I must commend them for the quality of speakers, both international and local. I think that they’ve done very well, in bringing together all of the different views and all of the different textures of opinion on the appointment of judges and the larger questions around the administration of Justice System.

I have had the privilege of experiencing many parts, if you like, of our profession and the public service. Just as you heard, have been the Attorney General in Lagos. I’m still; I think I consider myself an academic, a private practitioner and now a politician.

I know that there are very many different aspects of the questions that we are faced with today. And there are many different, if you like, contours to this issue. But one thing that stands out and I think I would like us to just focus our minds on that, is that the question of the integrity of our judicial system is central to everything.

It is central to how our economy works because our judiciary arbitrates on all economic disputes, commercial disputes. It is central to social justice; it is central to the maintenance of the Rights of Citizens. It is central to democracy as we have seen, the courts decide at the end of the day, who was properly elected or who was not properly elected. Even sometimes way beyond what the electorates do, the judiciary decides practically who becomes who. So, the question of those who make those decisions, how they are appointed, who they are, is absolutely important.

If people feel that justice is impossible, if people feel that way, then they lose hope in the system and then, of course, they may resort to self-help. Now, it is unfair to simply say that our problem is bad judges, and the reason why I can say so is that in some senses, I’ve looked and seen all sides of the issue. As I have said, I’m today a politician. I’ve seen all sides of this matter.  So, you can’t simply say; “look, the problem we have is bad judges”. You can’t pick out the judiciary alone for sanction when you are talking on of some of the failure in our system of administration of justice.

I must say to you, that our system of administration of justice is under pressure, under severe pressure, especially from an elite that wants to get ahead at all costs.

We have an elite and when I speak of the elite, I speak of the Nigerian elite, both the political, religious, commercial, the business elite, everyone wants to get ahead. We want to own things, we want to control things, and it is a winner-takes-all situation. We want to own the judges too, so the Nigerian elite, the politicians, the business elite, people want to own things because they want to be sure of all the outcomes and they want all the outcomes to favor them.

So, when Justice Amina Augie said, “lobbying starts where a politician wants his own person to be on the bench”, she is absolutely right, she is spot on.

Most politicians and practically everybody else wants their own person on the bench because they want the outcomes to favor them. That’s the same pressure that we have with respect to federal character.

Federal character is no longer necessarily seen as choosing the best from a particular zone or a particular State, it is the interest in that State or that zone, who want to further their own purposes, that would want to come together to ensure that a person who is appointed is not necessarily the best, but is the one that is most suited to their own purposes.

This is a problem that we have and I want to say that this is a natural human feeling. Most people in the world would rather have a situation where everything worked in their favor. That is what will happen in most places in the world, whether it is America, England, wherever. They would rather have somebody who will favor them, who will favor their own point of view. But the point that I would like us to bear in mind is that every nation that has succeeded, makes up its mind at some point, on how to give ourselves the best environment, the best circumstances to succeed.  How do we do that? How do we give ourselves the best environment, the best circumstances?

So, a frank and honest discussion at some point is usually necessary where it comes to the administration of justice, that frank and honest discussion must come between the legal profession, the Judiciary itself, the Executive, the Legislature and the very many elite interests in our society.

We must come together to ask ourselves a question, how do we decide and why should we appoint honest umpires?  Why do we need honest judges?  Why do we need to put forward the best team?  We must ask ourselves those questions and what is the next best thing to do.  We must all sit together and ask those questions, because if we leave it to what is going on at the moment and to the system that is going on at the moment, we’re headed in the wrong direction, clearly headed in the wrong direction. Because interests just as Justice Augie has pointed out, private interest group interests, political interests, influence how judges are appointed and that is a big problem going forward.

As I said, it’s a selfless and patriotic duty that we must as an elite sit down to talk about and to decide. We must choose, we must decide that if we choose judges because we believe that they will serve our interest, we will installmentally destroy our society. We must agree to an objective process, we must agree to rigorously examine, to test, to interview all of those who want to come forward as judges and we must agree to an independent process.

You know, when we want to win in football for example, in this country, in this same Nigeria, we choose the best. We want to win the matches, so we choose the best people. We know how to choose the best people. It is not that we have a problem with choosing the best people, even if we want an equal representation of every zone and every state, we know how. So, it just depends on whether we, the elite, we want this country to have the very best chance of success. If we do, we will succeed.

Let me just say as I close, there is no system that we’re looking at where the people were perfect, whether it is the UK, the US, if you read the histories of the administration of justice in the UK and in the US, you will find that a lot of them went through what we are going through in many different ways, but as some point, they decided, they were going to have the very best system possible.

These were not perfect people; some of those who made these decisions were corrupt, politicians, businessmen, all sorts of people.  But they decided that in our own self-interest, for self-preservation, we must do something to ensure that this society is run properly so that all of us can benefit. Because today you can own the judge, tomorrow somebody else owns the judge and then you are in trouble.

Today you can decide who does what, tomorrow somebody else can decide the opposite, so it doesn’t make sense and it does not make sense ultimately for the society. So, it is time for us to have this conversation and it’s a conversation that must be frank. It’s a conversation that must take into account, all of the various issues that we have experienced, it’s not a finger-pointing conversation.

You cannot say judges are bad, judges are corrupt. No. They exist within a system that has put pressure, not only on them but on even the process of becoming a judge. So, I think that it is time for us to have this very crucial and important conversation and I think that this particular webinar is an excellent platform for the beginning of that conversation.

I’m glad that the legislature is so well represented, the judiciary is also so well represented and of course, the politicians are also so well represented and there are so many of our friends and colleagues who are listening across the country and who are participating. I can see from the chats that so much is going on, but we need to sort out the administration of the justice system.

Just a final point, when in Lagos, we decided that we were going to have an objective process of selection of judges, we decided that anybody who is put forward as a judge will be examined.  There will be examinations, there will be tests, and then, of course, we had to provide for their welfare. We had to ensure that judges were shielded from corruption by adequate provision for their welfare, for their remunerations. Do you know that even then, people asked us, politicians asked us; this is our own turn to choose our own judges. This is our own turn to do this and that, we had to resist that and say, this is not a matter of turn by turn, if we want this State to have the best possible judiciary, let’s choose the best people because we are not going to be here forever.

I want to be able to stand before a judge, who I know will be fair even if they do not agree with me. I don’t want to stand before a judge who was chosen by somebody because it will serve their own interest. We are not always going to be in office anyway, we are not always going to be in a position to influence things.

I really hope that this will be the beginning of this very important conversation and that it will ultimately lead us to the best administration of justice system.

We have all the best minds in Nigeria, we have the best-trained people and there’s absolutely no reason why we cannot have men and women in the judiciary, even now in the judiciary, we have the best people. If we can prevent them from being unduly influenced, if we can help them to do their jobs better, I am sure that our country will be set for great things ahead.

So again, just to say thank you very much to the organizers and to say thank you very much to our local and international participants and to all of you who have participated.

Thank you very much, God bless you.