Opinion: Removal of Osun Chief Judge by Governor Adeleke; Our collective destiny cannot be mortgaged
Osun is becoming a theatre of mockery and disdain: a melodramatic state that thrives on high-scale bureaucratic grafts, impunity and malfeasance. No news, coming from Osun, can be more rudely surprising or rather shocking.
More benumbing is the regular theatrical twist that always accompany the terrifying and illegal storylines, being perfectly plotted by the lawless establishments paddling the state’s affairs.
The removal of the Chief Judge of Osun State, Hon. Justice Oyebola Ojo by the Governor Ademola Adeleke of is condemnable. Such impunity shouldn’t stand in our clime and legal system.
Matters concerning the removal and appointments of judges are clearly constitutional which ought to be devoid of any political interests. But Adeleke and the PDP yet again position osun on the map of mockery and tomfoolery. One shouldn’t have expected less from a government that laughably has a legal practitioner heading the Health sector in the state.
The provision of the law is crystal clear without ambiguities. In the case of Nganjiwa v FRN (2017), the court held that any misconduct attached to the office and functions of a judicial officer must be reported to and determined by the National Judicial Council (NJC). It won’t be an hyperbole to assert that the Governor lacks sound legal advisers.
Assuming without conceding that the allegations against the CJ are true, the governor should have reported the case to the NJC for the right causes of action to be taken.
The move by the Governor makes it crystal clear that the removal of Hon. Justice Oyebola has a political undertone, and the governor should be cautioned regarding this abuse of power and impunity.
The governor is therefore not in any position whatsoever to harass the judiciary and the chief judge in the performance of their duties.
More worrisome is the refusal to obey the interim order of the industrial court restraining the Governor from interfering with the matters concerning the office of the Chief Judge of the state of Osun.
The institution has been rather compromised through political rhetorics and technicalities. Governor Ademola should do the needful by signalling to the good people of Osun that his Government is not ‘above’ the rule of law and as a matter of fact, In Osun, our collective destiny cannot be willfully mortgaged.
— Abdulmalik Afolabi, LL.B, B.L.
