From a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, Prince Lateef Fagbemi, has come an advice to High Court judges in the country to stop rejecting political cases assigned to them by Chief Judges in their respective jurisdictions.
Fagbemi, a distinguished icon in political and electoral matters, gave the counsel on Tuesday in Ibadan at the special court session in honour of late Hon. Justice Ekundayo Kolawole, a retired octogenarian judge of the Osun State Judiciary, who died recently.
To Fagbemi, it had become a common attitude of some judges to excuse themselves from adjudicating over political cases assigned to them because of fear of how the judgment would go.
According to Fagbemi: “Any Judge that refuses to hear political cases or other cases is not fit to be a judge.
“We are in a political era.
“There will be many cases from local governments to the federal level and judges must try the cases and deliver judgments.
“There is no way the party that loses will not complain.
“That is why we have the Court of Appeal.
“A dissatisfied party is free to appeal to the appelate court.
“But this is not enough for a judge to reject such a case.”
Prince Fagbemi also declared that good character more than any other consideration, should play a pivotal role in appointing judges, describing late Justice Kolawole, who started his legal career in Ibadan, the old Oyo State, after his initial Engineering qualification, as an erudite judge that was free of corruption during his tenure as a judge.
The Chief Justice of Oyo State, Justice Bolajoke Adeniji, described Kolawole as a dutiful judge that enjoyed successful family life.
Adeniji explained that the late judge was a judge in Oyo State and when Osun State was created out of Oyo State on August 29, 1991, His Lordship and 10 other judges moved to Osun State and were sworn in as judges of Osun State on October 3, 1991.
“He bowed out of High Court bench on 22nd October 1993, having attained the statutory age of 65 years,” Adeniji told the gathering of retired Justices of High, Appeal and Supreme Court, as well as other SANs, including Chief Akin Olujimi and Oluwarotimi Akeredolu.
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