Why Conference delegates won’t sign final report - Investigatation

Delegates at the National Conference are planning not to sign the final report of the conference unless they are given copies to read before they would append their signatures on it.

Investigations by our correspondent in Abuja on Wednesday showed that the delegates felt that they needed to see the details of the reports.

Already, some of the delegates were said to have agreed that this condition must be met before they would append their signature to the conference’s final report.

It was leant that the promoters of this demand might have been influenced by some delegates who were not happy with some of the decisions arrived at during the debates on the reports of the 20 committees of the conference.

Some of the delegates were afraid that some contentious issues that were not agreed on or not favourable to them, could be inserted in the final report.

One of such decisions was the issue of derivation, which spilt the delegates during the plenary, as those from the northern part of the country said they would not support its increment from 13 to 18 per cent.

The northern delegates were asking that five per cent from the Federation Account be also set aside as National Intervention Fund for the reconstruction of the northern part of the country, which they said had been destroyed by the activities of terrorists.

While the northern delegates insisted that the fund must be enjoyed by the three zones in the region, which are North-East, North-West and North-Central, the southern delegates were of the opinion that the fund must be made available to all the zones in the country.

They also said the administration of the fund must start with the North-East, a proposal that was not favourably disposed to by the southern delegates.

This division made the Chairman of the conference, Justice Idris Kutigi, to announce on the day the plenary closed, that the issue of derivation and the intervention fund would be left for the Federal Government to determine.

“Conference therefore recommends that government should set up a technical committee to determine appropriate percentage for the three issues and advised government accordingly,” Kutigi had said.

It was issues like this that made the northern delegates to say that they would insist that the complete report must be made available for them before they would agree to sign it.

The spokesperson for the delegates, Dr. Junaid Mohammed, who spoke with our correspondent in Abuja on Wednesday, said there was no way the delegates would be forced to sign.

He said, “Up till now, they have not told us how the report would be. They just asked us to report, like school children, on August 4. The leadership is so disorganised and may not know what to do.

“There are issues we did not agree on apart from the issue of derivation, and I’m saying that nobody can force us to sign what we have not read or go through or issues we even disagreed on substantially.

“Neither Kutigi nor Prof. Bolaji Akinyemi can force us to do that. We are waiting for them to bring their joker.”

A delegate from the South-South region, Mr. Paul Enebeli, also said that the delegates were yet to be briefed on the way the report would be presented.

But he said the delegates might demand for the records of proceedings at the plenary to enable them to study issues that were discusse and were agreed on or rejected.

“We need sufficient time to go through the reports. But we have requested for verbatim reports of the proceedings during the plenary,” he added.

Another delegate, who is a former President of the Nigeria Union of Journalists, Mr. Lanre Arogundade, said it would be wrong for the northern delegates to insist on the five cent intervention fund.

He said the money for the reconstruction of the zone was the one the Federal Government had asked the Gen. Theophilus Danjuma committee on Victims Support Fund to raise.

He also added that the intervention fund been demanded by the delegates from the North could also make their counterparts from other parts of the country to make similar demand.

Arogundade said, “What do they want to do with that again? The N30bn that the Danjuma Committee has been charged to raise is enough. We should not encourage all these kinds of issues to be coming up. Why did you think our brothers from the eastern part of the country are also asking for money to be paid for the victims of civil war?”

Why Conference delegates won’t sign final report - Investigatation

Nyako’s defiance to NJC kept Adamawa without CJ –Investigation

Adamawa State has been without a substantive Chief Judge since the former helmsman of the state judiciary, Justice Bemare Bansi, retired from the bench three years ago.

Justice Bansi retired on July 5, 2011 and five acting CJs have been appointed in the state since then.

The reason, as our correspondent learnt on Wednesday, was due to the moves by the sacked governor of the state, Murtala Nyako, to ensure that only his preferred candidate was recommended by the National Judicial Council for appointment as the substantive CJ.

The constitution provides that before a governor can appoint a substantive Chief Judge, such person must be recommended to the governor by the NJC from a list of qualified candidates provided by the Judicial Service Commission of that state.

The former governor was on Tuesday removed by state House of Assembly.

The House of Assembly, in removing Nyako, said it acted on the recommendation of the seven-man panel set up by the current acting CJ of the state, Justice Ambrose Mammadi, to investigate the allegations of fund misappropriation levelled against him.

Mammadi is the fifth acting CJ since 2011.

His second three-month tenure started on July 6.

Incidentally, Nyako had recommended to the NJC to renew Justice Mammadi’s three-month tenure as the acting CJ before the judge set up the investigative panel which indicted him (the ex-governor).

It was learnt that the request by Nyako for the renewal of Justice Mammadi’s tenure after it ended on July 6, was part of the former governor’s continued defiance to the stance of the NJC that it would only recommend the most senior judge as the substantive CJ.

Mammadi began his first three month tenure as acting CJ on April 6 following the state government’s recommendation of his name to the NJC for appointment in acting capacity.

The government had recommended Mammadi after the NJC refused to confirm Justice Nathan Musa’s tenure in acting capacity for about the sixth time.

The appointment of acting CJs after Justice Bansi retired was said to have started with Justice Bathimawu Lawi.

After the death of Justice Lawi, Justice Banu was said to have been appointed as acting CJ and followed by Justice Umar Bobbo.

Sources said Nyako had vowed that Justice Bobbo, who was formerly his favourite ahead of Justice Banu, would never become the substantive CJ of the state as long as he remained the governor of the state.

A source said, “The governor had invited Justice Bobbo to his office shortly after becoming the acting CJ. The acting CJ, apparently aware that the invitation was to settle a dispute between him and a protocol officer in the state judiciary, had sent a message back to the governor that he (the governor) should be the one who should visit his (CJ’s) office if the governor needed him. Justice Bobbo made the same remark when the governor tried to invite him the second time.”

The source, who is very familiar with the crisis rocking the state judiciary since 2011, said it was at that point the former governor refused to renew Justice Bobbo’s tenure in acting capacity.

The government subsequently, with the approval of the NJC, recommended Justice Musa, and ensured he was the CJ in acting capacity for about a year, until the NJC rejected the former governor’s last bid to renew his tenure.

This was what necessitated the appointment of Justice Mammadi’s appointment as the acting CJ on April 6(punch)

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Nyako’s defiance to NJC kept Adamawa without CJ –Investigation