from the judicial conner

NJC Sacks 2 Judges, probes another  

Chief Justice of Nigeria, CJN, Justice Mariam Mukhtar

The National Judicial Council has recommended the  compulsory retirement of Justice C. E. Archibong of the Federal High Court Lagos and Justice T.D. Naron of High Court of Justice, Plateau state following investigations conducted by the Council on series of petition leveled against the duo.

Some of the allegations leveled against Justice Archibong were that he dismissed a grievious charge against an accused without taking his plea and refused to release the Certified True Copy of his Ruling to lawyers. He was also accused of issuing bench warrant on some officials of Peoples Democratic Party, PDP, for contempt even when the counsel who was directed by the Court to serve them filed an affidavit that he had not been able to serve the contempt application.
Archibong was said to have also made unfounded and caustic remarks on professional competence of some Senior Advocates of Nigeria and exhibiting glaring procedural irregularities which showed that he did not have a full grasp of the Law and procedure of the Court.
Another allegation was that the judge granted the leave sought for in an originating summons that had no written address of the parties and without hearing both parties in the originating summons after he had earlier on overruled the preliminary objection.
On the other hand, Justice Naron’s compulsory retirement was recommended  by the NJC to Governor David Jonah Jang following findings by the Council that there were constant and regular voice calls and exchange of mms and sms (text) messages between the judge and one of the lead counsel for one of the parties to the Suit in the Osun State Gubernatorial Election Tribunal, contrary to the Code of Conduct for Judicial Officers of the Federal Republic of Nigeria in Section 292 (1)(b) of the 1999 Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.
In the exercise of its disciplinary powers under the Constitution, the National Judicial Council has suspended the two Judges from office with immediate effect.
In a Press release signed by Mr. Sojo Oye, the Acting Director of Information at the NJC, the Council further stated that it had set up a ‘Fact Finding’ Committee to investigate the allegations leveled against Hon. Justice Abubakar Talba of FCT High Court in the Police Pension case of EFCC vs Mr. John Yusuf & Others, where the court granted a controversial N750,000 fine  to John Yakubu Yusufu who pleaded guilty to stealing N29 billion from the pension office.