The Chief Judge of Ekiti State, Justice Ayodeji
Daramola, has tabled before the National Judicial Council ahead of the
council’s meeting scheduled for Thursday, a petition accusing the state’s
Governor-elect, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, and the police of complicity in the attack
on judges and court workers in the state last week.
A copy of the September 26, 2014 petition
addressed to the Ekiti State Commissioner of Police of which was also attached
to a covering letter sent to the Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Aloma
Mukhtar, as the Chairman of the NJC, was obtained from
a police source in Ado-Ekiti on Tuesday.
The covering letter sent to the Chief Judge
was learnt to have been dated September 29.
Justice Daramola, in his petition to both the
NJC and the Ekiti State Commissioner of Police, accused Fayose of leading a
large number of thugs, who disrupted court proceedings, beat up judges and
court workers and also tore court records.
He also accused the policemen and other law
enforcement agents deployed within and outside the court premises of “looking
on completely uninterested and unconcerned” while the attacks by the thugs on
the court workers and users lasted.
The Chief Judge justified the closure of the
courts in the state after the mayhem, an action which he said was to avert
“looming danger within the premises of the High Court of Ekiti State” after the
police officers “posted to guard and protect the integrity of the court and its
personnel have failed us and left us at the mercy of political hoodlums”.
It was also learnt on Tuesday that Fayose had
through, his lawyers, sent a separate petition to the NJC, alleging that the
Justices of the Governorship Election Tribunal, sitting in Ado-Ekiti High Court
headquarters had received bribe.
Fayose alleged that the panel
members had been bribed by Governor Kayode Fayemi and the All Progressives
Congress to rule against him on September 25, when the court proceedings were
disrupted by thugs allegedly loyal to him.
Fayose led thugs to court
But the Chief Judge, in the petitions both
entitled, ‘Ekiti State Judiciary under siege of political thugs,’ chronicled
the invasion of the court premises in Ado-Ekiti, by thugs between September 22
and September 24.
The petition read in part, “Now on Thursday,
the 25th day of September, Mr. Ayodele Fayose, the governor-elect, again led
thousands of people and thugs into the premises of the High Court beating and
maiming members of staff.
“The thugs invaded my court where I was to
deliver a judgment in a land matter, tore the record books, beat court
officials and vandalized the furniture in Court No. 1.
“The political thugs descended on Hon.
Justice J. A Adeyeye, the presiding judge in Court No. 3 beat and dragged him
on the ground. The judge’s suit was also torn into shreds. I could not gain
entrance into the premises of the court and had to hurriedly turn back on being
alerted that I was the prime target of the hooligans.”
Justice Daramola said the attack on the court
on September 25 was preceded by a similar siege on the court premises on
September 22, when thugs allegedly loyal to Fayose disrupted court proceedings
apparently to avert the delivery of a ruling which they suspected could go
against the governor-elect.
The plaintiffs in the suit are challenging
Fayose’s eligibility to contest the governorship election.
The CJ said he was at the Supreme Court in
Abuja attending the special court session marking the commencement of the new
legal year and the conferment of the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria on some
lawyers when the violence first broke out on Monday, September 22.
A copy of the petition reads in part, “On
Monday 22nd day of September, while I was attending the Supreme Court Special
sitting in Abuja, I was called on phone that thugs loyal to Mr. Ayodele Fayose
have invaded the headquarters of the judiciary of Ekiti State where Hon.
Justice I.O Ogunyemi was delivering a ruling on the matter instituted against
him.
“The thugs beat workers black and blue while
the presiding judge and lawyers had to run for their lives. They smashed
windows and furniture. Meanwhile, the policemen deployed within and without the
premises in large number were looking on completely uninterested and
unconcerned while these thugs were on prowl beating and maiming workers and
court users.
“The thugs went on searching for the judge
who ran into hiding. It took your (the Commissioner of Police) personal
intervention when you were duly informed on phone to rush to the scene of the
mayhem within the court premises to rescue the said judge and took him out into
safety.”
According to him, from the events which
followed that of September 22, it appears that the whole episode of violence
was pre-planned.
His petition further read, “The above in the
main was just the beginning of what would appear to be a pre-planned long siege
and onslaughts on the court and its personnel.
“The political hoodlums showed again in large
numbers on Tuesday, 23rd and Wednesday 24th of September, 2014 on the spurious
ground that they came to listen to the ruling which they did not allow the
presiding judge in Court No. 6 to deliver on Monday, September 22, 2014. No
such ruling was slated for hearing since the thugs invaded the premises of the
court on Monday.”
The Chief Judge said all entreaties to the police
and law enforcement agencies to intervene in the mayhem yielded no positive
response.
He stated, “It is needless to reiterate here
that while the mayhem and attack on judges and staff and property of the court
was in progress, scores of policemen and SSS (State Security Service)
operatives posted to protect lives and property within the court premises
looked on and watched without taking any step to save the situation.
“All entreaties to officers and men of Ekiti
State Command to protect the court as an important institution of state yielded
no positive response.”
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