A case for special anti-corruption courts [OPINION]

By Simon Kolawole

When President Bola Tinubu sent an extravagant message to Mr Yahaya Bello, former governor of Kogi state, on his 50th birthday last year, I shook my head in disbelief and despair. My mind went straight to the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC), which had spent enormous time and energy investigating Bello. It is also not a message of assurance to Nigerians, who already do not rate their president on matters of accountability and transparency. The agency decided that Bello had a case to answer and invited him for questioning. But for a long time, Bello refused to report to the EFCC. He carried on as if he owned the world. He was declared wanted by the anti-graft agency.

After all the dramatics, Bello was charged to court for alleged fraud in various sums running into over N200 billion. While we were at it, the ruling party, the All Progressives Congress (APC) — which unseated the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) in 2015 using fighting corruption as one of its tenets —appointed Bello as a member of a high-powered committee. Bello himself is all over town talking like a super star, even threatening to run for the senate. If I were him, I would even desire to be national chairman of APC. Was Dr Abdullahi Ganduje, former governor of Kano state, not made chairman while facing a charge of alleged corruption? Why shouldn’t Bello even aspire again to be president?

Get me right: I am not saying because Bello was charged to court, then he was automatically guilty. My limited knowledge of the law is that until a defendant is declared guilty by a court of competent jurisdiction, he is presumed to be innocent. I want to be very clear on that. However, there is something called optics, and there is something called signalling — especially in an underdeveloped democracy like ours. If I am EFCC chairman or police IG and a suspect I am prosecuting in court is openly dancing with the president — who appointed me in the first place — I will definitely not find it funny. You cannot tell politicians not to politick, but there is something called body language.

I watched the recent interview of Mr Ola Olukoyede, the EFCC chairman, on Channels TV where he spoke on the Bello situation. He had previously vowed that he would resign rather than abandon the investigation of the former Kogi governor. “Have I not made good that promise of commitment? Is Yahaya Bello not being prosecuted? The case is still in court,” he said. “I have three cases against Bello. Am I the judge who would determine the conviction? I have done my work. I have fulfilled my mandate. Nigerians must know that, and they must also encourage us in doing more. This man has been investigated, and we have filed charges against him, and the matter is gaining traction.”

An interesting example is that of Alhaji Sule Lamido, the former governor of Jigawa state. He and his two sons were charged to court by the EFCC for alleged corruption nearly 10 years ago. The case dragged on forever and forever without the substance being tried. Lamido had filed a no-case submission and fought it all the way to the Supreme Court. The apex court finally ruled some days ago that Lamido should stand trial. Imagine the time and resources already wasted over the years. Now, we start all over again. We have evolved a corruption trial system that places more emphasis on technicalities than substance. That is why we hardly make serious progress with prosecution.

After watching the Olukoyede interview, I became more convinced that we need extraordinary measures to improve the outcomes of the anti-graft war. One of such measures would be the creation of specialised anti-corruption courts to save time and resources. Some corruption cases have been on since 2007 without recording any headway. By the time a case drags on for four years, the public would have lost interest. The cases can be quietly thrown out without media attention or public outrage. Many of the cases involving former service chiefs and senior military officers that were instituted in 2016 have faded out without any further public interest. That is Nigeria for you.

I do not pretend to have a magic solution to the problem, but I have allowed myself to speculate that a possible solution is creating courts that will devote 100 percent attention to corruption cases. We need to, at least, reduce the workload on regular courts and shorten trial times. The judges usually say their dockets are full. We need to appoint and train more judges with special focus on corruption, since we seem to agree that it is a major stumbling block to good governance and development. The Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) does not permit endless adjournments once trial starts, but this has been observed mostly in breach. You can’t blame the judges: they are overworked.

I am not unaware that there are many factors contributing to delayed trials. It is not just about the courts. For one, the EFCC used to be quite notorious for filing cases before conducting proper investigation. In some cases, the agency would first file a charge before interrogating suspects and preparing the body of evidence for prosecution. That is, the agency itself is not even ready! You would also find the EFCC being the one asking for adjournment in a case it is prosecuting because one witness is in Greenland or Gaza. One of the things Olukoyede promised to do when he became EFCC chairman was to prepare water-tight cases before going to court. That is a major step forward.

Investigations can take years in a country like the UK but by the time you are charged to court, prosecution will be strict business. Once trial commences, you would hardly hear of endless adjournments. Most adjournments are for the purpose of delivering judgement, as both prosecution and defence will have closed the case. So far, Olukoyede has promised to address this sloppiness and this is already evident in the number of convictions the agency has secured in internet fraud cases. Some of the suspects in this category of fraud hardly put up a strong defence because of the weight of electronic evidence against them in court and this has produced a record number of convictions.

But, without a doubt, some factors are not within the control of the EFCC, especially the cases that have to do with the big politicians. Those ones have the capacity to undermine the judicial system. They have all the resources to engage senior lawyers, and some of the senior lawyers have all the mischievous knowledge on how to delay and derail trials through technical arguments that will be pursued from the high court to the Supreme Court while the substance of the case remains untouched. Technical arguments can go on for years, by which time the system is compromised and the case watered down. This has been a major hinderance to the successful prosecution of cases.

I tried to pick the brain of a senior lawyer on the proposal for special anti-corruption courts. He said the law establishing the Code of Conduct Tribunal can be amended to tackle the challenges of capacity and numbers. We have to improve our system, especially when it is not delivering optimal results. The idea of specialised anti-corruption courts is not mine — it is something campaigners have been suggesting for years. We already have a specialised court for labour matters: the National Industrial Court (NIC). To tackle the challenges facing the anti-corruption war, special courts must be considered as one stepping stone. The system needs to deliver justice fairly, squarely and swiftly.

Culled from TheCable