Opinion: Justice And Democracy: Buhari Show Your Capacity

Posted by African Examiner Articles/Opinion, Latest Headlines Wednesday, May 20th, 2015

By Segun Odujinrin – I have decided to put up this article only because of my believe that democracy protects people from injustice amongst other important elements involved.

My cousin looked at me in shock disbelief when I told him of my intention to write this. His reasons are not far fetched. For instance Seun knows me for my social uprightness and as one who ordinarily would not support criminal activities and criminals alike, actually one of the reasons I decided to quit as a Defence Lawyer in criminal litigations and opted for cooperate law.

The Buruji Kashamu extradition saga please take note I said extradition saga not his drug saga, I have decided to emphasize EXTRADICTION because that is the moral and of course the legal issue at stake here as far as I am concern, has dragged on for too long without commentators taking into cognizance the fact that the Rule of Law which is a great component of democracy being looked at with a fine comb. This issue that was started due to political shoulder movements in my dear state where politics has taken a frenetic dimension, has now become a global issue as seen on a BBC documentary a few days ago. So I will look briefly at the genesis of this issue with a look at the role that has been played so far by political gladiators in Ogun State and beyond.

The Politics

From my investigations which has taken me as far as calling up OGD boys, OBJ’s men, Amosun’s people and of course Buruji’s disciples, I have been able to trace the genesis of this saga to 2009. The main actors in the commencement of this saga were Wale Adedayo, Kola Onadipe, Kayode Oladele(today a member of house of rep elect), Oladunjoye and Col Soda.

When Buruji according to my findings approached OGD(a man that I have great respect for from the first time I met him in 1996) claiming he wanted to join his structure, OGD according to my findings, being the trusting man he is, did not realize Buruji was actually acting a script from Sen Jubril Martins-Kuye through his protege Sen Lekan Mustapher who is a life long friend and associate of Buruji. He OGD therefore took to Buruji hook line and sinker. The link man between OGD and Buruji became a Wale Adedayo. All was going on well, until an Oladunjoye took over and stole the romance between Adedayo and Buruji claiming OGD asked him to. Now the advent of IBURA(oath taking) called OGIDI OMO was initiated to a neophyte politician in Buruji( so they thought) by Adedayo on behalf of OGD(so he claimed) became huge in the ijebu axis of Ogun PDP until Kola Onadipe, Soda, Ozogula(claimed to be the henchman for OGD), Yomi Majekodunmi, Yanju Lipede and a few others decided that Buruji was getting too powerful and decided to throw a spanner in the works.

At this stage, OGD called on Buruji to stop distributing his largesse from Ijebu Igbo and start distributing through the party but that had come very late for OGD as his entire structure had been decimated in that axis. The next move for Buruji/ Lekan Mustapha was to start a new move called the OMO ILU foundation with brains like Segun Seriki acting as anchor for the group. To cut this short, the Omo Ilu group in it’s sophistication, decided to introduce what I will call judipolitical strategy(my own word). The result of their quest for political justice rather than cutlass or thuggery justice, brought about so many judgements which became a tool to finally decimate OGD and his followers before they were politically pushed out of PDP.

Prior to the final episode in 2011, OGD and his men from my investigation had tried all sorts of strategy to reduce the influence of Buruji’s oath taken through the inducement of pecuniary elements which was driving the Omo Ilu group to becoming a formidable group at least in Ogun East. Enter Kayode Oladele a very ambitious US based lawyer whose eyes are on him becoming the first Yewa Governor in Ogun State. Kayode Oladele approach OGD with a juicy proposal with the caveat of becoming a member of his exco and in future a candidate of PDP in the 2011 elections. The reader will wonder what this juicy proposal was abi? Ok here it is. The proposal was the genesis of the Buruji saga that we have today. Oladele was sponsored on many occasion to the US by OGD to gather as many documents and info as he can for him to present to the FG after Oladele had claimed he was part of the prosecution in the US, Oladele effectively did as he had proposed and in no time, all the newspapers in Nigeria were a washed with paid adverts in 2010 of the case law on Buruji in the US and why he had to be extradited. Enter OBJ. The OBJ group sensing that without the many injunctions with Buruji, they were not going to achieve any meaningful feat against the ferocious OGD machinery, decided to go into bed with a man that had so much hanging around his neck. I was tempted to ask a close associate of OBJ, Chief Bode Mustpher why they decided to play with Buruji then? His answer which he gave to me in his charismatic manner, was that the “man was innocent until proven guilty” (this I will address later in this write up). Hmmmm I thought aloud and asked him if now they have a prove that he was guilty as such should be extradited? He answered without knowing that it was the lawyer of equity in me that was at play, he said yes the evidence to show Buruji is guilty was enoumous. Hmmm evidence not a known court judgement, I quickly said to him, “sir enormous evidence is not a pointer to guilt”

Sorry for the digress above, so the OBJ group readily accepted that they successfully fought OGD and destroy his good works by using Buruji and his tool, until the PDP congresses where again the dexterity of this man Buruji came to play and again he judipolitically decimated the OBJ group not only in Ogun State, but the entire Southwest. This was the nail for OBJ. Baba immediately went searching for the Kayode Oladele documents which was made readily available to him. This started the national and international agitation of Buruji’s extradition irrespective of the demands of national and international laws.

Law And Democracy

The fact that democracy carries an element of free access to justice globally, is of huge concern to me. Buruji has shown in so many publications and interviews directly or indirectly through his lawyers that courts in a jurisdiction I know all too well has exonerated him in the presence of the US prosecutors, I have taken the pain to check the various judicial reports on this matter, and feel strongly that YES Buruji has been exonerated in the UK. I have also taken time to look at the facts from Nigerian courts with regards to this case, once again Buruji has a lot in his favour. I have looked at the US case, and I find it a lazy effort by the circuit court to want an extradition without following due process.

Looking at so many case law on extradition request by the US(something they like to do with impunity), I am persuaded to bring to the Nigerian public the Roman Polanski extradition case. I will just give a brief on the ratio decedendi of that case, the court in Switzerland in their judgement clearly rejected the request by the US to extradite the popular film maker due to laziness of prosecutors and total lack of evidence which borders on impunity. The French and UK courts in so many cases, have thrown out extradition cases to the US because of reasons ranging from injustice, lack of respect of other countries laws, draconian sentencing system and impunity. In as much as I am supporter of dignity in the society, I am struggling to agree that Buruji should be extradited for no reason.

In conclusion, President Buhari’s mandate is to provide security and justice to all Nigerians irrespective of their party affiliation. The world will be watching if the narrow minded political war which started in Ogun State and has been escalated to a global issue, would make Buhari dance to the tune of OBJ who obviously used the same man at a time he found auspicious to do so. Secondly, many countries have shown how independent they are with their court decisions and one would expect Buhari to further enhance the strength of our democracy through his respect of the independence of our judiciary. Nigeria is a great country.

I must state clearly that I have never met Buruji and do not know him but I respect the fact that my checks has shown that this man has won all his political battles through political dexterity and has never been one day accused of political violence. But I must advise him to settle his quarrel with OGD and together they can move mountains in Ogun politics.

By Segun Odujinrin