The Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) national chairman, Prince Uche Secondus, said the position of the Nigeria Bar Association (NBA) over alleged fear of insecurity and intimidation of judges vindicates the party’s position that the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC) is using “devious means to obstruct justice”.
The NBA President Paul Usoro SAN had in a speech last Thursday stated that ” the level of insecurity in the country and the attack on the independence of the judiciary and the legal profession constituted a threat to the rule of law and by extension the country’s democracy”.
Prince Secondus in a statement issued by his media adviser, Ike Abonyi, noted that “The NBA boss said that the climate of fear instilled by the federal government undermined the independence of the judiciary and the ability of judges to act confidently without fear or favour in dispensing justice as they are threatened, intimidated and blackmailed by mostly the executive arm of government and their agencies at federal and state levels.
Secondus said that judges and justices by their calling cannot speak out publicly even if they are under pains except through the bar as has been eloquently and timely done by the bar association and said that all democratic watchers should note this concerns.
According to the statement: “Prince Secondus said that the opposition has remained resolute in crying out loud against harassment of those with opposing views because it clearly envisages the danger of concentration of power in one hand especially with a leader who has no history of appreciating and respecting democratic tenets and principles,” he said.
However, he expressed the hope that even in the face of harassment and intimidation, the Nigeria judiciary knowing their critical position in the sustenance of democracy in the land and being citizens who are resident in the country, knows that Judiciary is the last hope of the ordinary people and that no nation grows on injustice.
