A legal Practitioner based in Abuja, Barrister JOHNMARY CHUKWUKASI JIDEOBI, has descended heavily on the Chairman of the Code of Conduct Tribunal sitting in Jabi, Abuja. The Justice Danladi Umar led Tribnal came under heavy attack for the irregular in which it has so far carried on with the trial of the Senate President, Dr. Saraki. In a very powerful article made available to Odogwublog.com, the Lawyer isolated two ignobel conducts of the Tribunal Chairman for scrutiny. According to the Lawyer, "Going through the entire proceedings so far, which this writer has been privileged to attend at the CCT in Jabi, two conducts of Justice Danladi Umar have been accentuated for criticism and they are;
(a) His conduct over the Motion on Bias filed by one of Dr. Saraki’s Counsel, Oluyode, Esq.
(b) His conduct on the 7th day of June, 2016 in relation to the cross-examination of the Prosecution Witness, Wetkas, by one of the defence counsel, Paul Usoro, SAN.
I will take them seriatim.

On the conduct of the Tribunal Chairman towards Barrister Oluyode who wanted to move a motion of bias the lawyer wrote;
"The above being the position of the law, it would be seen that Dr. Saraki was well within his rights and duly followed the law in raising the complaint of bias against Justice Danladi Umar. It is also the law that whenever an application or a motion is filed and the attention of the court is drawn to it, the applicant is entitled willy-nilly to be heard on it. It becomes a sacred duty on such a Court/Tribunal to hear and rule on such application one way or the other. Justice Danladi Umar therefore fell into a patent error when in anger he refused to hear the motion filed by Dr. Saraki through Mr. Oluyode, Esq. This position of the law was accurately and carefully stated by Justice Tobi when he pronounced thus;
“A court of law or a tribunal has a legal duty to hear any court process, including a motion before it. The process may be downright stupid, unmeritorious or even an abuse of court process. The court must hear the party or parties and rule one way or the other. Judge, whether of a court of law or tribunal, has no jurisdiction to come to a conclusion by resorting to his wisdom outside established due process that a motion cannot be heard because it has no merit. That does not lie in the mouth of a Judge in our adversary system of adjudication.” See Eriobunah v. Obiorah (1999) 8 NWLR (pt. 616) C.A. 622 at 642.
Instead of Justice Danladi Umar hearing the motion filed by Mr. Oluyode and ruling on its merit, he ‘resorted to his own wisdom outside established due process’ to declare it a rubbish and refused to hear same. He went to the extent of threatening the counsel with contempt. Was he right in so doing?"

On the statement made by Justice Umar to the effect that the consequences Saraki will meet from the Tribunal at the end of the trial will not be reduced, the Lawyer wrote;
"In the course of the proceedings of 7th June, 2016, while the Prosecution witness was under cross-examination, Justice Danladi Umar stated as follows;
“I am not happy at the delay tactics by the defence counsel and I must say this thing out that this delay tactics will not reduce the consequences the defendant will meet in this tribunal at the end of the trial,”
The above statement obviously was not supposed to come from the mouth of an impartial arbiter. He threatened that the defendant standing trial will “meet consequences from the tribunal at the end of the trial”. He went further to add that the consequences alluded to shall not be “reduced”. This unfortunate statement, which did not go down well with both the Defendant and his Lawyers, prompted the Defence team to file yet another motion on bias asking the Tribunal Chairman to disqualify himself from further sitting on that particular matter. That motion has been argued and Ruling thereon reserved till 11th July, 2016. It will be remembered that the Prosecution witness who is under cross-examination by the Defence team tendered massive documents exceeding two thousand pages on which the prosecution is relying on in expecting to ground the conviction of Dr. Saraki. This particular Prosecution witness gave evidence for days to his satisfaction without any complaint from any quarters. How come the Defendant is not equally being allowed to test the veracity or otherwise of such testimony by diligent cross-examination? It is indeed his right, and a constitutional right for that matter which cannot be abridged by anybody. In fact, I will go further to add that the defence has the constitutional right to cross-examine the Prosecution Witness on ALL the pages of the documentary exhibits tendered. That is fair hearing as loudly embodied in the audi alteram partem principle." Accusing Justice Danladi of Bias, the lawyer postulated; "A Judge that allows a prosecution witness to give evidence for days, to his satisfaction, and who in the process tendered tons of documents running into thousands of pages while denying the defence the opportunity to thoroughly cross-examine the same witness so as to test the veracity or otherwise of his testimony is biased. He is biased because that conduct is against the spirit of fair hearing. That makes him a partial arbiter. A Judge who, instead of allowing counsel to move a motion of bias against him, threatens counsel with contempt, is biased and at the same time operating “in terrorem” which is outside the parameters of his jurisdiction. See F.R.N. v. Akabueze (supra). A Judge who has warned the Defence team of lawyers that the “consequences the defendant will meet from the tribunal at the end of the trial shall not be reduced” at a time when the Prosecution is yet to close its case is certainly biased against the Defendant."He closed his write with a prayer for the nation as follows; "As I am dropping my pen, I pray for my nation, Nigeria. May we no longer continue to produce Danladi Umars in our Judiciary. May my generation never ever witness a judiciary peopled by the Danladi Umars of this world. May myself, my loved ones and friends never suffer the grave misfortune of having any of our matters tried in a court or tribunal where the Danladi Umars of this world are presiding. May our matters never be heard in a court or tribunal where justice is clothed in darkness, where finding justice is akin to finding a needle in a haystack. At last, we are assured by the sacred scripture that notwithstanding the biased judgments of the Danladi Umars of this world, God’s supreme judgment will overtake us all. We all must stand before the Supreme Master and the Great Architect of the universe. In the evening of our lives, we must come before that incorruptible Judge whose judgment is just and final. We are rest assured and consoled that in the end, untainted and unadulterated justice will “surge like waters, and righteousness like an unfailing stream”(Amos 5: 24). I say no more.




The full article is found on: http://www.odogwublog.com/2016/06/sarakis-cct-trial-justice-danladi-umar.html

Our own Pa chukwudi44 do more than this!! Where him dey sef

I beg park well u na dey look 4 job go meet Saraki 2 include u among his lawyers

Even Saraki can now see that it is no longer at ease. So what is this Barrister saying?