The lawyers and judges involved in this corruption mess are doing it because they know that justice is not guaranteed in Nigeria, especially because they and their friends are in charge of the courts.
The senator complained to the Presidential Advisory Committee Against Corruption (PACAC) being led Prof. Itse Sagay.
Also yesterday, it was learnt that most of the nine arrested judges had petitions against them with the National Judicial Council (NJC).
The Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Mahmud Mohammed, is said to have the list of judges to be investigated in the last five months.
Although the list was shown to some legal authorities by the CJN, no action was taken by the NJC.
PACAC has as much as 50 petitions sent to it against some of the judges by Nigerians who have been denied justice by the alleged corrupt connivance of the said judges.
One of the complaints came from a senator who alleged that a judge demanded about N50million from him to influence a case but he paid N30million.
The money was delivered to the Court of Appeal Justice in dollars.
But following the senator’s inability to pay the balance of N20m, the judge gave judgment against the senator, it was alleged.
A source said: “The senator told us that the judge asked for N50million but he could only pay N30m and lost the case for not meeting up with the balance.
“He said when the judge came at night to collect the bribe, he stuffed every available space and went to a ridiculous extent of stuffing some of the money in his shoes. The judge then decided to walk barefooted to his car.
“We have the complaint against the judge and the senator is ready to testify because the judge did not refund the N30million to date. The government is going to see to the logical conclusion of this case against the judge.”
Asked to name the judge, the source added: “The Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Mr. Abubakar Malami (SAN), disclosed the name of the justice at a session with the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) to underscore why the bench must be rid of bad eggs. The NBA has been briefed, let them also talk.
“This is to show that government is transparent about the whole process. It is not a witch-hunt at all.”
On the arrested judges, the source added: “The DSS is ready to tender the video clips in court. In fact, some of the judges will be shocked by the professionalism of the security agency.
“The clips have already been shown to a few lawyers to prove that due diligence was followed. We hope the court will allow the prosecution to show the clips during trial."
