MONDAY UBANI: Gani Fawehinmi Is Weeping In His Grave!

It’s simply preposterous! This column was outraged beyond words upon reading a recent statement made by notable lawyer, Mr Monday Ubani, SAN. Speaking on President Bola Tinubu’s certificate saga, Ubani is on record to have said: “Certificate omission doesn’t invalidate Tinubu’s nomination.”

This column would have ignored anyone else saying this. Even notable lawyers and silks have said more outlandish things flowing from the Tinubu morass. But not from a Monday Ubani. The reason is that in the last two decades, Ubani has built a solid reputation in legal practice as a social critic, human rights lawyer, defender of the defenceless, crusader for a better society and indeed, a greater Nigeria.

He is also known as an acolyte of the great legal luminary, Gani Fawehinmi. Among his colleagues, he is regarded as a brilliant lawyer too, it must be acknowledged. Therefore, making this perverse submission on this vexed issue of President Tinubu’s certificate saga is beyond umbrage. It is insensitive, an assault on the psyche of millions of Nigerians who suffer physically, economically and psychologically through the fact of the president’s obviously forged entry documents and his attendant lack of capacity to lead.

Yet the president continues to perjure himself serially and relentlessly. Nigerians have suffered gravely and vicariously because since 1999, a man who’s not qualified to be a governor did not only become a governor of a Nigerian state but he’s currently the president of Nigeria in the past three years.

Monday Ubani, our supposed silk (SAN) must be trying to be funny with Nigerians on this. It’s either he is fishing for a bumper brief from Aso Rock or he’s angling for some personal gains, because the magnitude of irrationality in his statement is beyond reason. His postulation is so obtuse that a protégé of his who felt assaulted had to upbraid him on social media.

The young lawyer who said Ubani trained him and was his mentor disagreed with him vehemently but albeit, courteously. He has never looked Ubani in the eye but in this matter, he would cross swords with him. So what could have pushed Ubani to walk unforced, into the Tinubu miasma? Some observers have wagered that he’s angling for something.

They say that he seeks to join the Bola Tinubu legal team as it is expected that many causes would follow this issue and many more matters concerning Tinubu. ADC candidate, Atiku Abubakar has sued already. Even the matter brewing at the Department of Justice (DOJ) in the United States would require the services of senior and partisan lawyers. It could also be said that Ubani has become mealy-mouthed like most Nigerian silks.

The noble rank of Seniors Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) among Nigeria’s legal practitioners has in recent years, become the bane of the Nigerian society. SANship has become a metaphor not only for gross privileges, but a crass instrument for graft and perversion of the Nigerian Judicial system. The silk class in Nigeria may have become an evil cabal working against the very country they profess to protect. It’s SANs who have become conduits for suborning the judges.

It’s the respectable silks who collude with Aso Rock and governors to engage in money laundering through outrageous legal fees. It’s the strutting silks who convert disputed major land cases and huge estate by turning justice on its head. The silk in Nigeria now covet billion-naira briefs or nothing thus damaging the legal system and indeed, Nigeria’s jurisprudence. All this to the extent that the process of earning the silk has been vastly monetised and debased.

We see senior silks daily procuring SANship for their children, wards and associates. SAN has not only become a symbol of abuse and opportunistic cravings, it has become a totem of corruption in Nigeria. Most cases of the miscarriages of justice in elections matters are choreographed, orchestrated and championed by so-called SANs. Has Monday Ubani been infected by the SAN virus, some have wondered?

Of course Ubani is spoiling for a battle of wits, legalese and technical jargons in defending this matter, but even a layman knows that the Tinubu matter is not about “certificate omission,” but outright perjury and the serious crime of forgery among numerous other misdemeanors in between. It is hoped that someday soon, Ubani would explain to Nigerians what exactly he’s up to.

Would he accept nary an intern in his chambers who does not show evidence of primary and secondary schooling!? Would any company employ a staff who has no proof of early education? How did the president gain admission into the university without pre-qualifying certificates? Is it not public record that even the president’s university certificate may have been forged as the school has disowned it? If therefore certificate omission doesn’t invalidate a candidate in this instance, what does? Perhaps Tinubu has a special nomination criteria different from other major candidates? If Peter Obi omitted some of the requisite certificates, we can guess what might have been. The heavens would have fallen.

Monday Ubani is widely reckoned to be an apostle of the late people’s lawyer, Gani Fawehinmi, but this column can almost see the crusader squirming in his resting place now. It was the great Gani who in October 1999 challenged Tinubu’s (then governor of Lagos State) fictitious certificates in the Federal High court, Lagos. For three years, battling through the appellate and Supreme courts, Gani pursued the matter to its logical conclusion.

Though the obdurate Nigeria police refused to investigate Tinubu’s phoney documents as ruled by the Supreme court, Gani won some landmark precedents in Nigeria’s jurisprudence. For instance, it was established that a president, governor or any elected public official under the cover of immunity can be investigated nonetheless, and tried when his or her immunity lapses.

This column wagers that were Gani alive today, Tinubu would never have become a president with the same dud documents Gani had fought against in 1999.

If certificate omission doesn’t matter to Ubani, then what matters? Nigeria has suffered what may be described as suicidal incompetence of President Tinubu in the last three years. Many commentators have concluded already that Tinubu has already earned his place as the worst president in Nigeria’s history. Under his watch, millions of Nigerians continue to sink into the abyss of poverty and hopelessness.

Is Ubani proud of the fact that Nigeria remains the IDP capital of the world; a country with the highest number of out of school and starving children? Why, for that matter, would we renominate a president who cannot debate, doesn’t grant press interviews or inspire us in any way as a people? We think Ubani is trying his hands on what sociology calls elite subterfuge.

According to Google, it’s “high-level, sophisticated deception, … used by powerful individuals, groups or institutions to maintain influence… or achieve hidden objectives.” Ubani has a selfish agenda here!

Apart from the Osun people and their governor, Ademola Adeleke, who owned the moment, Nigerians too gained so much from the electoral success in Osun State. It would seem the INEC no longer has a monopoly of the iREV and election results transmission gadgets. In fact about two independent platforms were ahead of INEC in releasing results. That’s the real victory that can be replicated next year.

The musician, Davido showed the glory of star power. His electioneering shows would have galvanised the youths of Osun to no mean magnitude. Chief Iyiola Omisore, the Ife titan, scored high.

RAUF AREGBESOLA is a big loser. If he couldn’t win substantial votes in his domain it means he has no electoral value to take to ADC.

Former GOVERNOR ADEGBOYEGA OYETOLA has suffered a resounding back to back defeat from Governor Ademola Adeleke. The very low-energy fellow really needs to retire to a health farm and stop making a fool of himself.

OLAGUNSOYE OYINLOLA who acted so dishonourably must think retirement now as he has committed political harakiri in the afternoon. One wonders where he’s hiding his face now. Ditto for SEN. FRANCIS FADAHUNSI. In decent societies he would be a stone throw from a jail already for inciting genocide.

The biggest losers, of course, are President Tinubu and his APC. Though they try to convert their loss to a moment of honour, they fell face down like Humpty-Dumpty. Not after spending tens of billions and partaking in the squelching of scores of Osun people, it was a blood duel won by the hardy Ademola Adeleke.