Barely 48 hours after
the Department of State Services, DSS, had taken seven suspected corrupt
judges into its custody, details of what led to their arrests and how
they were picked up from their homes by operatives of the agency began
to emerge last night.
Competent sources close
to the operations told Vanguard that the agency could no longer watch
and allow corrupt judges use their positions to engage in sabotage,
subversion and espionage latching on huge proceeds of corruption.
A source said that unknown to most Nigerians, some of the judges had
been collecting huge bribes to subvert the will of the people, using the
proceeds to acquire choice property and build fat bank accounts without
putting in enough efforts to do the job they were paid to do.
The source said that based on series of petitions from concerned
Nigerians to checkmate the excesses of the corrupt judges, the DSS moved
in and began a covert investigation, which finally led to the
establishment of prima facie evidence against them.
“As we speak now, we have incontrovertible evidence of brazen corruption
against the seven judges in our custody and we are ready to charge them
to court, even tomorrow.
‘’By our own analysis, the rot in the political scene – election
rigging, inter and intra-party crises and election petition trial from
tribunal to Supreme Court – gave rise to the deep corruption in the
judiciary.
“In the economic sphere, Nigeria lost cases to foreign investors due to
the collusion of judges with foreigners, leading to the loss of hundreds
of billions of Naira by the country, among them, the Malabo Oil deal
where the country lost over $2 billion.
“We have the mandate not only to pre-empt and prevent but also to take
necessary actions to bring the culprits of economic and financial crimes
to book.
‘’That is why we are challenging those who think that our action is
unconstitutional to take us to court since we cannot allow Nigeria’s
security interest to be jeopardised.
“Let it be known that anybody whose action can create hardship for the
rest of Nigerians must be stopped by us before the crime is committed
and there is no other agency that is as capable of doing that as the
DSS,’’ the source said.
It was learned that the DSS had an easy access to the bank accounts of
the detained judges and actually established that they had been taking
bribes from many sources in the discharge of their duties but used the
names and pictures of their wives, children and siblings to open such
banks account, which were not known to most of those whose names
appeared in the bank ledgers.
“When we brought in most of the children, wives and relatives of the
suspects based on the papers we got from the banks, they did not even
have an idea that their names had been used by the judges to open such
accounts.
“But you see under the Bank Verification Number, you must put in your
passports, name, signature and others. So, for some of the judges, who
used fake names and their wives names to open the accounts into which
they paid in the proceeds of crime, they foolishly appended their
signatures or used their pictures, something that gave them out.
“From what we have found out, some of the suspects acted foolishly in
committing the offence because they cannot prove that even if their
children were to earn N1 million monthly since they were born till date,
none of them can accumulate the amount of money we have traced to their
accounts and the type of property they have.
“Look, it may interest you to know that one of the two Supreme Court
judges in our custody has a property worth N1.5 billion in one of the
South-South states. If we may ask, where did he get the money to set up
such project?”
“As far as we are concerned, there is nothing unusual in arresting
corrupt judges and taking them to court because it would be an offence
against the nation to continue to turn a blind eye to mounting
corruption in the judiciary.’’
The official also pointed out that another judge, who is being detained
and questioned, disguised as a shopper in one of the supermarkets and
ended up collecting bribes in Dollars from a ‘client’ only to be caught
on CCTV camera.
The official expressed regret that the National Judicial Council, NJC,
which had the responsibility to track and punish corrupt judges, had
tended to condone evil being perpetrated by the corrupt elements, citing
the cases of three indicted judges as example.
“The NJC, having been satisfied that the three judges demanded and
collected heavy bribes, merely recommended the retirement of the one who
took a bribe of N200 million and asked him to be paying back in bits to
the complainant. So, we ask, what happens to the proceeds of crimes? No
answer was given until we stepped in.
“Similarly, the two other judges were retired with full benefits, smiled
away. Since then, the NJC has not been cooperating with us and we
cannot allow the rot to continue in the interest of Nigeria.
Turning to the appearance of Governor Nyesom Wike at the scene of the
arrest of a suspected corrupt judge of the Federal High Court in Port
Harcourt, the official noted with concern the action of the governor,
wondering what he went to do at that time of the night, if he was not
part of the judge’s deal.
“It was the governor, who blocked the DSS operatives from seizing the $2
million crime proceeds, which the judge had made from the PDP crisis
stoked by a faction backed by the governor.
“But for the our highly professional operatives and service direction,
we would have beaten up Wike that night so that he would have
explanations to make on why he went to a crime scene at odd hours and
aided a suspect to move $2 million crime proceeds to an unknown
location.
“But we already have an idea of where the money was moved to and we are
going to retrieve it and bring the judge to trial. As a matter of fact,
we are going to treat the Port Harcourt FHC judge case as a ‘special
case’, given his collusion with the governor to obstruct our work.
“The behaviour of the judge has worsened his case. In the last three
months, the judge has been going across the Nigerian borders with other
countries collecting bribes for himself and others.’’
The source also indicated that the judges might be allowed to go home as
soon as they answered the questions put to them by the operatives,
adding that they were being given royal treatment, in view of their
status and the need to give them a conducive atmosphere to speak up.
The seven judges arrested and currently in detention at the SSS office
are Justice Inyang Okoro and Sylvester Ngwuta of the Supreme Court;
Adeniyi Ademola of the Federal High Court, Abuja; Kabir Auta of the Kano
High Court; Muazu Pindiga of Gombe High Court, Mohammed Tsamiya of the
Court of Appeal in Ilorin, and the Chief Judge of Enugu State, I. A.
Umezulike.
It was learned that no fewer than eight other corrupt judges are being
investigated and would soon be picked up to have their day in court.
bAttempts by Vanguard to get the names of the eight judges were
unsuccessful last night, but they are said to be spread across the
country.
Attempts to speak with the Director General of the DSS, Mr. Lawal Daura,
proved abortive, as the agency is yet to appoint a spokesman since the
last one was retired last year.
Vanguard.