In this piece, a prominent member of the inner bar, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa (SAN) examines the true definitions of democracy and justice in relation to how both have been experimented in Nigeria from 1999 till date and concludes that what has happened in Nigeria in the last 21 years is not democracy but a mere civil rule without justice.
Different people have different concepts of justice, depending always, on the circumstances and indeed the setting.
But the universal idea of doing right to all manner of people, the concept of equity and fairness, to give to one what is due to him and not to deny people their rights, give the broad outline of what justice should be, at least to all mankind.
Nigeria has ‘experimented’ with uninterrupted democracy for well over 20 years, since the return to democratic rule on May 29, 1999.
Therefore, the term ‘democracy,’ is familiar to most Nigerians. However, I cannot vouch with due respect that most Nigerians, especially the ruling elite, fully understand the meaning and modus operandi of democracy.
Meaning of democracy
From the simplistic but articulate definition of Abraham Lincoln of democracy as “the government of the people, by the people and for the people” to James Roland Pennock, who in his book ‘Democratic Theory’ defined democracy as “Government by the people, where liberty, equality and fraternity are secured to the greatest possible degree and in which human capacities are developed to the utmost, by means including free and full discussion of common problems and interests”, a common trend that runs through the concept of democracy is that democracy is a form of government, that places the people at the centre and in which decisions by elected representatives, must reflect the wishes of the majority of the citizens.
In essence, democracy is a system of government that operates within the rules of law, that respect the rights of citizens to dissent with government without fear of harassment and where the fundamental rights of citizens are guaranteed and protected by the State.
In my introduction above, I deliberately avoided the use of the term ‘practice’ in relation to democracy in Nigeria and in modesty, opted for the word “experimented’ for some obvious reasons.
Nigeria cannot in fairness ascribe itself with the toga of democracy, simply because the President or Governors are not putting on camouflage. It cannot also lay claim to democracy on the basis that every four years elections which cannot meet the test of democracy, are conducted by INEC (the electoral umpire) in most parts of the country, while in the local government elections, the party which controls the state governments must of necessity win all the local councils in that state. The kind of democracy being experimented in Nigeria can as well pass as civil rule and no more.
The shape of Nigerian democracy is well captured by the columnist Israel Ejike, in his article titled “Nigeria’s definition of Democracy” published in Thisday newspaper of October 14, 2018 thus: “Nigeria’s democracy can be defined as a system of government where a group of political business men and women specialized in using tokens and beautiful promises to promote ambition of selected business managers to preside over affairs of the country or state government. These individuals execute their game of deception by hiring thugs specially recommended for rigging, wrangling the electorate in elections. Security operatives in this system of government become observers in the rigging process. The rich cabal after declaring themselves or stooges winners, sit back and feast on the commonwealth of the people. If the people dare protest bad governance, they will be treated as criminals.”
He goes further in his description thus:”From the sombre definition of democratic practice above, it is valid to include; non-payment of salaries for civil servants as a norm, only personal projects of those elected get completed, public projects exist on paper or abandoned. Voices of dissent are crushed, the constitution is mostly jettisoned. A true picture of Nigeria’s specially tailored democratic practice is overseen by the ruling cabals – a group of special deities who once ruled Nigeria under the military or civilians who once participated in pro democratic protests under military rule. These special power blocs choose a preferred candidate, who could be one of them or a mentee often known as “anointed candidate”. After their choice is debriefed, the cabals identify with a political party of choice and the rest is history.”
Can anyone fault Ejike’s definition of the ‘Nigerian Democracy” when he further describes it thus?
“The system is looted dry before they leave, when they do, they handover to a political son to continue the process of looting all over again. Our home-grown democracy is not without supporters. These supporters could be anybody but the interesting group, are educated individuals who have conscripted themselves to certified hypocrites, sycophants or blackmailers. Some are paid, others just join the bandwagon. The country can burn for all they care. These platoons of goons are specialists in making bad leaders look good. They are always ready to sell alternative views anywhere policies of their liege draw flaks from right thinking people. They are the fuel that keeps empty, inept leaders’ locomotive train running.”
Without prejudice to the view canvassed above, my usage of the word ‘experiment’ on the other hand is an indication of hope. Hope in the potential of the Nigerian State to develop a full democratic system in the governance of our Country. This hope is built on the fact that the practice of democracy is a journey. A journey which the American activist Michael puts thus: “Democracy is not a spectator’s sport. It’s a participatory event. If we don’t participate, it ceases to be democracy.”
The concept of justice
At this juncture, there is the need to interrogate the concept of justice. What is justice, if I may ask? What was it that prophet Amos meant when he said “let justice roll like water and righteousness like streams of living water? (Amos 5:24). At the outset, it would seem that it is a very simple concept to define, however when placed in the context of different societies, circumstances and personal idiosyncrasies, one cannot but continue to ponder on what justice really means.
This same debacle of definition was faced by early philosophers and writers. For instance, Plato sees justice as “a virtue establishing rational order, with each part performing its appropriate role and not interfering with the proper functioning of other parts.”
For Aristotle, justice “consists in what is lawful and fair, with fairness involving equitable distributions and the correction of what is inequitable.” Kant defines justice as “a virtue whereby we respect others’ freedom, autonomy, and dignity by not interfering with their voluntary actions, so long as those do not violate others’ rights.” Mill sees justice as a collective name for the most important social utilities, which are conducive to fostering and protecting human liberty.
From the various definitions and perceptions highlighted above, it would be correct to assert that the true perception of justice is dependent on the circumstance, location, orientation and beliefs of those who clamour for it.
In summary, justice is giving each one in the society what is due to him. I do hope that we can say this of the present situation of Nigeria, at least going by the ‘visitations’ to the temples of justice during the EndSARS protests. The image of the young man adorning the wig and gown, with a big machete in his hands, right inside the court premises, gives us the idea of his expectation for instant justice; one in which cases will be decided promptly and without the usual delays.
Though very unpalatable watching the desecration of the temple of justice by those who need it most, some hard lessons must have been passed to us the stakeholders, namely that society is dissatisfied with the kind of justice system that we have bequeathed to them from the colonialists, which is purely elitist and unable to cater to the needs of the mass of our people. Let us for once then feel what others feel, concerning the justice system in Nigeria, wherein litigants die before justice could reach them or they get judgment devoid of justice, at the end of the day.
The challenge then is to find what needs to be done, to guarantee justice to our people, if we all agree that it is the bedrock of democracy. And it has to be so, because the alternative to justice cannot be imagined at all.
The rule of might has never endured in any sane society, as arbitrariness, impunity and lawlessness will take over and the idea of democracy will only then be a mirage, said to be alien to Africa, whereas in the early days of our forefathers, the indigenous democratic system worked well for them in all ramifications. The challenge is to blend our model with those of the other regions.
Coined from its ordinary meaning which is the layer of solid rock below the soil, the Word ‘Bedrock’, according to the Oxford Advanced dictionary, means the fundamental principles and ideals on which something is based.
Flowing therefrom, it is posited that the pursuit of justice lies at the very heart of democracy. In that the tenets of democracy dictate that though the majority would have their way, the minorities must always have their say.
Within the context of the Nigerian state and its multi-plural, ethnic and religious make-ups, there is the yearning for justice from different peoples, regions and age-brackets within the Nigerian state dating back to the Sir Henry Willink Commission and thereafter the Lyttleton Constitution. This is reasonably so because democracy is not a vague concept. It is a system that comes with some expectations from the citizens and where these expectations are met, one can then talk of justice. It is basically set up to deliver justice to citizens in a plethora of ways, which we shall briefly highlight below: Electoral justice; Protection of fundamental rights; Economic justice and Judicial justice.
Electoral justice
The only legal process for hiring and firing leaders/representatives in a democratic setting is through elections. This is the only means through which section 14 (2) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria (as amended) can become real and active, when it provides that “sovereignty belongs to the people of Nigeria from whom government through this Constitution derives all its powers and authority”. Consequently, the authority of a state and its governments are created and sustained by the consent of its people through their elected representatives. The consent of the people obtained through free, fair and credible elections, gives legitimacy to the government in the performance of its functions to the people. Elections in this context must not be confined to the casting of ballots on the day of election but the whole gamut of the process, which usually begins with voters’ registration, primary elections of the political parties, campaigns/campaign funding, etc, through to the announcement of winners.
Thus, any act which compromises any of the stages of the election is electoral injustice. It is electoral injustice where party structures are hijacked by money-bag politicians who foist their anointed candidates on the party. It is electoral injustice on the Nigerian people where the sanctity of the ballot is compromised by the electoral umpire, in concert with security collaborators and a particular political party. It is electoral injustice where the wishes of the people are truncated by judgments from the courts. It is electoral injustice on the Nigerian people for the government of President Buhari to refuse to sign the amended Electoral Act, which would give legal teeth to full deployment of technology in our electoral process. These issues deserve serious introspection if Nigeria must deliver a democracy, where justice is pivotal.
Protection of fundamental human rights
It is the legitimate expectation of citizens in a democracy that justice would be served by their governments, through the protection of their fundamental rights, at all times. The Nigerian Constitution has attached the needed importance to same, with its devotion of a whole chapter i.e. Chapter IV, for this purpose. This is an important function of law in a democratic society. For in the absence of law mechanism in this regard, society slides to the Hobbesian state where might is right and where life is nasty, short and brutish, in the words of the English philosopher Thomas Hobbes. One cannot talk of justice in any democracy, where the rights of the citizens are trampled upon by the government they have “elected” to serve them. It is an act of injustice where the forces of state are deployed in an irresponsible manner to repress dissenting voices and foist fear in the minds of the people; for as attributed to Thomas Jefferson: “When government fears the people there is liberty, when the people fear the government, there is tyranny.” It is thus no more democracy, where citizens cannot ‘SOROSOKE’ against the ills of society.
Economic justice
In his description of this concept, Tom Kibasi, former director of the Institute of Public Policy Research, London in his article titled “What is Economic Justice and why does it matter”, defined economic justice thus: “Economic justice is the idea that the economy will be more successful if it is fairer: that prosperity and justice go hand-in-hand rather than in opposition to one another.”
Economic justice encompasses establishment of a thriving economy that produces sustainable growth and increases the prosperity of the people; it is the just re-distribution of wealth in the society, putting into consideration the demography of age groups, region, sex and other indices in the economy and it projects fair distribution of the wealth of that economy across all generations i.e. the present and future generations. That is the purport of what is captured in the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals), which defines sustainable development as “the development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
It is thus a clear mark of economic injustice, for the government and people of this generation, to deplete the environment in an irresponsible manner through indiscriminate waste disposal and non-adherence to building master-plans in urban settlements, continue gas-flaring unabatedly and to keep accumulating loans from developed countries, which are thereafter deployed for servicing recurrent expenditures of governments and heaping for the future generations, unnecessary burden of re-payment of these kinds of loans. That certainly does not accord with the concept of Justice that we all dream of.
