O
Oladipo Abiola
Guest
Former President of Nigeria, Goodluck Jonathan, has cautioned the judiciary against making pronouncements that can be detrimental to the nation’s democracy.
Jonathan, who spoke on Thursday in Abuja at the 67th birthday celebration of Prof. Mike Ozekhome (SAN), said he is disturbed by the judgements emanating from various courts on political matters in the country recently.
The former Nigerian leader specifically lamented the decision of the Supreme Court that a ward chairman of a political party could suspend the National Chairman of the party.
According to him, the apex court ruling is responsible for the current crisis in the Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) and had also caused problems for the All Progressives Congress (APC) previously.
Jonathan argued that such court pronouncements could be likened to turning a cone upside down, which increases its propensity to fall.
“When a cone is turned upside down, it cannot stand because any little thing that touches it will fall,” Jonathan submitted, noting that such judgements were capable of destabilising the democratic dispensation in the country.
According to him, empowering Ward Chairmen of political parties to suspend their National Chairmen is against the natural course of justice as it is empowering a subordinate to remove his/her superior from office.
“You cannot tell me that the head of a department can expel the vice chancellor.
“Since that judgement was given, it has created all forms of instability. The PDP is in crisis today because of that judgement. The APC also faced the same problem at a time.
“Look at how other nations work; I have never seen where the sub-unit disciplines the principal.
“I am therefore pleading with the Supreme Court to review that judgement because it had turned the cone upside down,” ex-President Jonathan added.
He made the observations shortly after he was brought to the podium by former President Olusegun Obasanjo, who was originally named the Chairman of the occasion, but however, while proceeding to the podium to make his remarks, took Jonathan along with him, and announced him as the co-chairman of the event.
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