The Older A Judge Is On The Bench The More Experienced, More Tolerant And More Just He Becomes — Yunus Ustaz Usman (S.A.N)

*Says In US No Retirement Age For Judges
*Questions Nigerian Constitution For Fixing 70 Years As Retirement Age
*Calls For Greater Welfare For Judges Ahead Of 2023 Elections
*Advocates For Direct Primaries

A Kaduna based Lawyer and Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), Ustaz Yunus Usman, SAN has made a case against retirement of judges. He interrogated the Nigerian system that provides for retirement of judges during the valedictory court session in honour of Honourable Justices M. L. Muhammed; G. I. Kurada; and L. D. Aba on the 10th of January, 2022 at the High Court Complex, Bida Road, Kaduna.

The three judges bowed out of the Kaduna Judiciary upon the attainment of the statutory age of 65 years. Ustaz said his knowledge of Hon. Justice Mairo Muhammad is limited to the Court room. She is friendly, yet a non-nonsense Margaret Thatcher. She abhors lawyers’ delaying tactics adding that all his efforts to have judgments delivered by her against him set aside have so far failed

He said Justice Kurada was his classmate in the Faculty of Law, ABU Zaria, from 1979-1982.

“He was my classmate in the Law School from 1982-July, 1983. He has at all the time I had known him to be too quiet, too honest and too minding-his-own-business. He was not one of those who always slept in the library yet he, unlike me, came among those on top of the class in every sessional examination. To confirm my humble opinion of this legal judicial star, his decision in El-Zakzaky has ratified the fact that Kaduna State Judiciary is a totally independent judiciary. I do not know between me and Kurada, who has tampered with his age. It seems he has increased his while I might have reduced mine by a year.” Ustaz added

He also said that Justice L. D. Aba and him have practised in Kaduna State for long and he knows the judge to be an impressive person who has at all times impressed me in his practice and as a legal judicial star.

Ustaz questioned the rationale behind retirement age for judges in Nigeria. He said a judicial officer who is a workaholic may not find it easy long once he is out of his erstwhile busy schedule unless he can be kept busy by part-time appointments. He said his little experience which is in litigation from 1983 to date is that the older a judge is on the Bench, the more experienced, more tolerant and more just he is. In America whose judicial system we are blindly following, judges have no retirement age.

“Lord Denning was still sitting at the age of 93 and delivering sound judgments. The first black to grace the American Supreme Court Bench (Lord Marshal) who lived between 1755 – 1835 was a Justice of the Supreme Court from 1801 – 1835 (35 years in the Supreme Court Bench). Uwais and Belgore, Chief Justices of Nigeria who retired some years back ought not to have retired until perhaps now; they are still at their mental alertness than many of us in this hall today who claim to be in the age bracket of 60 years or so. Why did the constitution have to force such best judicial assets out on retirement simply because they were 70 years? The irony of our situation in Nigeria is that we import bad foreign policies and cultures hook, line and sinker and abandon the good ones.

“The former South African President De Clark became the Vice-President to Nelson Mandela. Honourable Justices Bubo Ardo and Mamman Nasir voluntarily left the apex court to be chief judges of North Eastern states and Presidents of the Court of Appeal respectively. Honourable Justice Umaru Abdullahi left Court of Appeal to become the Chief Judge of Katsina State just to nurture the newly created Katsina State judiciary then. So, what is wrong in a former judge appearing before other judges as an advocate?

“Justice Owen of Plateau State High Court attempted to do so upon his retirement in the 1980s. He was prevented and perhaps, that gave birth to the entrenchment of subsection (2) of Section 256 of the 1979 Constitution and Section 292(2) of the 1999 Constitution.”

He therefore recommended that “Section 291 of the Constitution which forces judicial officers to retire compulsorily at certain ages be deleted. If a judicial officer wants to retire voluntarily, he is free to go.” Ustaz said

He advocates for Obedience to court orders by the Federal Government. As regards the prevailing insecurity in the country, he advised that the Federal government should order that in any State where insecurity persists, the security chiefs of those States should be automatically retired. According to him, “I bet you that with this suggestion, insecurity would come to an end in Nigeria. Any other advice is a mere academic exercise.”

The learned silk further expressed concern that the allegations against few judicial officers in election matters have always been terribly embarrassing. According to him, Mukhtar, former Chief Justice of Nigeria once said that the corruption is carried out with the active connivance of some senior lawyers, which is trying to erode public confidence in our judicial system.

“Some Senior lawyers who are in this bad habit should know that neither those who send them nor even those to whom they are sent will ever have any iota of respect in their inner minds for them.

“To stop these ugly embarrassments and allegations, Judicial officers must be adequately remunerated with all their allowances and perquisites of office regularly paid. Most states in Nigeria today are guilty of not paying Judges Salaries and Allowances on time or slashing and paying these allowances in a way the Hausa call it: ‘Biyan Wulakanci’ (payment in such an installment that makes it useless to the payee). It is almost impossible for a hungry man not to be corrupted unless we are not telling ourselves the truth. I have been saying it time without number that our judicial officers have not been adequately taken care of and one cannot discharge his judicial duties without fear or favour on an empty stomach. It is my humble view that a hungry judicial officer may be forced not to have the patience, tolerance and alertness his calling deserves and invariably end up getting angry with inflammable tendencies at the expense of justice. It invariably may lead to the self-same judge or judges of coordinate jurisdiction giving contradictory decisions on similar cases as was witnessed widely in 2015 Election matters.” Ustaz opined

Lastly, the learned silk backed the direct primaries proposed by the National Assembly. According to him, for Buhari “to ensure that the person who succeeds him has that overwhelming and convincing victory like himself, I sincerely advise that he should reconsider his stand in his views against direct primaries. I personally believe that the only way to ensure that the rightful persons are voted into power in 2023 is via direct primaries and allowing private candidature to contest all the elections. The drums of war by politicians are already raining, against particularly, the presidential election in 2023.”