A book authored by activist lawyer Dele Farotimi has drawn the fury of legal luminary and founder of Afe Babalola University Ado Ekiti (ABUAD), Afe Babalola.
The book, a raw and unfiltered account of the author’s views about the Nigerian justice system, is titled, ‘Nigeria and its Criminal Justice System’.
Mr Farotimi alleged in the book that Mr Babalola, a legal heavyweight in the top echelon of Nigeria’s legal profession, corrupted the Supreme Court to procure a fraudulent judgement in the service of his clients.
The freewheeling, no-holds-barred book, giving specific details, calling out names and referencing events, is arguably the most unsparing account of perceived corruption in the history of Nigeria’s justice system. Mr Babalola vehemently denied the allegations in the book.
Citing the conducts of lawyers and judges across courts in the case of Major Muritala Gbadamosi & Ors v. H.R.H Oba Tijani Akinloye & Ors, the author wrote that the Nigerian justice system has been marred by corruption, mirroring the broader systemic issues plaguing the country.
“The Nigerian justice system is in itself criminal, lending credence to how the criminality of the judiciary is completely reflective of the Nigerian state in its full ramifications and with full evidence of how this rot; having become systemic is insidious and reaches to the very top of the judicial system,” he stated.
What Farotimi’s book says of Afe Babalola
Mr Babalola petitioned the police in Ekiti State over his characterisation in Mr Farotimi’s book, prompting the police to invade the author’s office in Lekki, Lagos State, on Tuesday.
In a widely condemned move, the police drove Mr Farotimi to Ado Ekiti State, where he was detained and subsequently charged with criminal defamation.
The police arraigned him on 16 counts at a chief magistrate’s court in Ado Ekiti on Tuesday, 10 Decrmber, with the court remanding him in prison until next Tuesday set for the hearing of his bail application.
Mr Farotimi’s writing leading to Mr Babalola’s petition and the author’s subsequent arrest and prosecution are contained in the Foreword and other pages of the book pinpointed by the police.
The Foreword itemised 10 points summarising alleged roles of Mr Babalola and other individuals informing the author’s broad conclusion that Nigeria’s justice system is criminal in nature.
Excerpts from the Foreword reads:
· That Aare Afe Babalola corrupted the Supreme Court to procure a fraudulent judgment in the service of his clients.
· That the law firm of S, B. Joseph & Co, procured a warrant to execute the said judgment by doctoring the original judgment of the Supreme Court.
· That Atilade O, Justice at the time and the Administrative Judge of the Lagos Judicial Division, unlawfully issued a warrant of execution based on the doctored judgment and without the enrolled order of the Supreme Court.
· That Atilade, J (Justice Atilade) quashed the fraudulently obtained warrant following an application of counsel in protest against same.
· That Aare Afe Babalola, Olu Daramola, Olu Faro and the law offices of Afe Babalola & Co, (Emmanuel Chambers) compromised the Supreme Court and the remaining semblance of integrity it might have had, when they went back to the Supreme Court and got that court to swim in the sewer of corruption and shameful self-abnegation.
· That Lawal Pedro SAN, at the material time the Solicitor-General of Lagos State, corrupted himself, abandoned the interests of the State, its citizens and any pretense to decency and became the undisclosed attorney to the Eletu family thus betraying the public trust.
· That Afe Babalola libelled me and the fact of the libel became known to me in his suit against Lawal Pedro SAN.
· That I sued Afe Babalola SAN for libel and that he leveraged his influence in the judiciary to deny me justice.
· That Oyekan-Abdullai, J was the instrument of injustice employed to deny me my day in court.
· That the Nigerian Justice System is criminal and complicit and can therefore not uphold the tenets of true justice nor the dispense thereof to which it is sworn.
Other claims by Farotimi
The police identified other excerpts from various pages of the book considered to be defamatory against Mr Babalola.
These other excerpts are reflected in counts 7,8, 9, 10 and 11 of the defamation case police filed against Mr Farotimi.
In the pages, Mr Farotimi elaborated on his allegation of how Mr Babalola allegedly corrupted Nigeria’s Supreme Court. He said Mr Bablola, in connivance with five Justices of the Supreme Court, corrupted the integrity of the court and the interest of the citizens and the state that they swore to protect.
In pages 10-11, Mr Farotimi wrote, “I have always been familiar with the fact of our perversion as a people and I have few illusions about equity and justice reigning in Nigeria but I had always assumed that there were lines that should never be crossed. I was however slapped awake by the brazenness of the judicial brigandage unleashed on hapless citizens, corporate, and individuals by the Nigerian Supreme Court, acting under the direction of Aare Afe Babalola. At least five Justices of the apex court have been identified as guilty of odious corruption and or gross incompetence”
In page 59, he wrote about the role of a judge of Lagos State High Court allegedly working along the direction of Mr Babalola, who he referred to as “the grandmaster of judicial corruption in Nigeria”.
The excerpts read, “But even as Atilade J played the contrition game, she was already part of the game plan corruption in Nigeria being stitched together by the grandmaster of judicial corruption in Nigeria, Afe Babalola. I have come to the conclusion that the required form of the application and her ruling were all part of the insidious plans of Afe Babalola, his band of crooked lawyers and coterie of crooked/incompetent justices of the Supreme Court.”
He also wrote on page 66, “But apparently, we had underestimated the extent of the putrefaction of the Supreme Court and the extent of Chief Afe Babalola’s corrupt reaches into the innards of the Supreme Court”
In pages 70 to 71, Mr Farotimi alleged that Supreme Court justices acted with utmost carelessness about the integrity of the court in doing Mr Babalola’s biding.
“But the court as though enthralled by whatever Afe the Circus Master had Promised the Justices, acted with utmost carelessness about the integrity of the court, the interest of the citizens and the State that they had been sworn to protect. The conspiracy was always a step ahead of us because some of the clients mistook key members of the confederacy of friends and helpers,” the excerpt read.
In page 80, the author stated, “But Afe knew that he could get the Supreme Court to do whatever he wanted and to rule however he asked. Pedro knew this too and he being the original Lagos boy, showed Afe a bit of Lagos magic. Afe Babalola and the Eletus might have killed the buffalo but had no way from feeding from the carcass. We have turned the corrupt triumph at the Supreme Court into a pyrrhic victory and it was at this point that Pedro craftily inserted himself into the plot.”
Denial
Mr Babalola vehemently denied all the allegations in his petition to the Ekiti State Police Command.
In the petition dated 9 November, Mr Babalola himself itemised 31 defamatory excerpts from the book.
“All these statements are false and incorrect written deliberately to destroy my reputation,” Mr Babalola wrote in his petition dated 9 November.
Mr Babalola said the defamatory statements have aroused the anger of right-thinking members of the society particularly members of the legal profession against him, his law firm and his lawyers.
“These statements are likely to set the legal profession and the society at large ablaze in a way that can disturb public peace.
“The statements have caused many of our clients to stay away from us and seek the services of other law firms,” Mr Bablola wrote.
He noted that book has been circulated all over the country particularly in Ekiti State where so many persons who respected me as an elder state man has expressed their disdain as a result of the defamatory statement made by Mr Farotimi.
He said the book has also been massively distributed online and has reached many persons globally who have expressed concern by Mr Farotimi’s intention to damage his hard-earned reputation.
“This is contrary to Section 374 of the Criminal Code,” he said.
He called on the police to investigate the matter “and stop Dele Farotimi from further damaging my reputation, the reputation of my law firm and that of my lawyers.”
‘They want to silence me’
After the publication of the book in July, Mr Farotimi said he faced undue harassment from the Nigeria Police Force, NPF.
In an X post, prior to his arrest, addressed to the press and titled, ‘They want to silence me,’ Mr Farotimi insisted that all allegations levelled In his book are factual, adding that aggrieved persons have the option of the court to obtain redress.
“I wrote the truth, and I stand by every single word in that book.” he said. “Even if one elects to pursue criminal proceedings and attempts to criminalise free speech, as Chief Afe Babalola is attempting to do, there is still a lawful process to follow,” he added.
He said despite honouring an invitation letter from the Zone 2 Police Command in Lagos on the 11 and 21 November, on the basis of a petition written by a lawyer on behalf of Tony Elemelu, a popular Nigerian banker, his friends, close associates and staff members were harassed and used as bait to illegally arrest him.
He said his friend, Sam Aiyedogbo, pastor of Realm of Glory International Churches, informed him that two pastors in his church – John Ntekume and Obiorah Ochokwu – were arrested by the police and coerced to write a statement
“The police showed them a petition written by Chief Afe Babalola in Ekiti State, addressed to the Ekiti State Police Command, and demanded that they lure me to the church to facilitate my arrest,” he wrote.
