By Dauda Adesina Joki-Lasisi, Esq.

Before my appointment as a cadet inspector and got trained at the Police Academy, Kano, in 1988, I’d first served as a constable for 2 years in Lagos state command. When we passed out of the Police College Ikeja in November of 1986, CP Saminu Daura (as he then was, he later rose to DIG. He is now of blessed memory), was the CP Lagos State command. The officer who was nominated by the CP to address us at the premises of the Lagos state command Headquarters was ACP Lawrence Makama, the command’s AC (Admin).

Throughout his address to us, ACPOL Makama was stressing and laying emphasis repeatedly that we all should keep it indelibly at the back of our minds, that Police job was one of selfless service, and never a money-making venture. He warned us sternly that if there was any of us whose ambition was to become a millionaire, such fellow should signify there and then, so he or she could be excused from service right away. For according to him, police job was not a place to realise such ambition. He, however, added with an ecclesiastical tone as follows….

“However, I’ve just told you the ethical requirements of Policing. But don’t be despondent or dispirited. For if any of you is destined to become a millionaire in life, nothing can stop it from coming to pass. So hope in God, eschew corruption, and be diligent at work.”

It was upon that philosophy that we grounded our service in the police. In fact, some of us were so loathful of money that we preferred working in postings where we were completely insulated from monetary inducement of any sort.

My very first posting was the checking point at Tin Can Island, on the Apapa/Oshodi Expressway, under the command of one very old inspector, called Magnus Kayode as the team leader. As I was on duty there, here came one white M/Benz car driven by a young man, whose name I later knew as Hakeem. I flagged the car to a stop, and I requested for his car particulars. The next thing he did was to bring out a brand new five naira note and begged me to take it in place of the particulars. Upon seeing the money, Acpol Makama’s words started to ring bell in my head like a clock alarm. Fears overwhelmed me, as if taking the money would result in a fatal consequence for me.

I asked the man to keep his money, and I insisted on seeing the papers of the car. It was then he disclosed to me that he was a driver to one Ambassador E.O. Kolade. He explained that his boss had sent him to go and clean up the car at the car wash, because the boss was due to travel abroad later in the day and it was with the car that he would drop him off at the airport. He confessed to using the car to run his personal errands. So, in a hurry to return home to pick his boss to the airport, he forgot the car’s papers at the car wash. He said if he had to go for the papers now, his boss would miss his flight. He promised to come with the papers as soon as he dropped his boss off at the airport and he picked the papers from the car wash.

I somehow believed his story. So, out of compassion, I asked him to hurry up to go and pick his boss. But Inspector Kayode, my own boss at the duty post, was not so convinced. He insisted that the young man should leave the car there at our checking point and go back to the car wash to pick the papers and show them to us. As a novice that i was, I joined the driver to be pleading with the inspector to let him go, so his boss wouldn’t miss his flight. The inspector scolded me for blind trusting the driver, solely upon hearing his own story without more. But I followed my conviction through. So, I kept begging the inspector, who then reluctantly allowed the driver to go. In doing so, I can still remember his words very clearly. He said…

“Oga (referring to me derisively as ‘oga’) has begged me to let you go. So you can go. But ‘oga’ next time, don’t come to me with this kind of stupid begging again o.”

The driver left us. Not quite an hour later, the same car surfaced again at our duty point. This time, the driver was with his boss, Ambassador E.O. Kolade. The boss beckoned to me and said “young man, come here*. I moved close to him. He then said further, “my driver told me you asked him to go so I wouldn’t miss my flight. He said he gave you money and you rejected it. Is that true?” I said yes sir. “Very good. Take this card (his complimentary card). I am traveling now. But I’ll be back in the country in two weeks time. You come and see me. God bless you”

As the car was about to zoom off, my boss, Inspector Kayode, waved it to stop and he asked the big man: “Gentleman I am the boss here at this duty post. What did you give my boy?” The man said I didn’t give your boy anything other than my complimentary card sir. And the inspector requested him to give him his card also. The man obliged and gave the inspector his card, after which the car zoomed off and left us. One day, I’ll tell the full story of how my encounter with Ambassador E.O Kolade had helped to shape my career positively in the Force. Suffice it to say now that since that 1986 till today, I am still relating with the old man. He is now a 93-year old great grandfather, residing with his wife in the United Kingdom. But we still relate like father and son till today !

In 1994, I was already an old Inspector of Police. I was shortlisted for pre-posting examination, the success in which was a requirement for posting to work as a detective in the prestigious Force CID, Alagbon close, Lagos. The examination panel was chaired by CP Jolade Ojomo (as she then was. Now DIG rtd). But my paper was marked by SP Adamu Mohammed (as he then was. Now IGP rtd). I was subsequently posted to the Force CID, following my success in the examination. But before our deployment to sections, we had to pass through a month’s induction training in which we were tutored by seasoned officers on the ethics of detectives at that level of criminal investigation. One of the very senior officers who came to lecture us was DIG Achibong Nkana, the then head of Force CID. In his lecture, he laid much emphasis on the need for police officers to eschew flamboyant and ostentatious lifestyles or open display of wealth. He said such lifestyles were inconsistent with policing ethics, particularly as detectives. Quoting a short aphorism which he attributed to Abraham Maslow, DIG Nkana said as follow….

“Hire a banker, and pay him maximally. Also use him maximally. If he is disposed to ostentatious lifestyle, sack him. Even if your inquiry about him revealed that his earnings were legitimate, still sack him and let him leave the fold of your work force.”

When the DIG got to that point, all of us the course participants rented the hall with murmuring, saying that was too harsh. For how could he be sacked, even when he was funding his glamorous lifestyle with his legitimate earnings without stealing from the bank? When the DIG noticed our displeasure, the then dropped the following aphorism to justify his proposition. He said…

“The banker with an ostentatious lifestyle deserves to be sacked, irrespective of the fact that was living on his legitimate earnings. This is because extravagancy, if not a crime in itself, can lead others into crime. Same goes with any police officer that lives an extravagant lifestyle. He too should be sacked like the banker”

Those were the morals that we were taken through in our days in police service. But due to the nature of human beings as a dynamic creature, things seem to have changed drastically between our days and now. Not only in the police force, but generally in virtually all areas of human endeavors.

It is only in this attribute of human dynamism that I think one can possibly find explanation for the impudence of CP Aderemi Adeoye, the retiring CP of Anambra state command. In his valedictory speech, the retiring CP was quoted as throwing down the gauntlet to challenge Dangote into a duel of wealth, boasting that his own business concern had geometrically risen to 20 billion Naira within the six years of its floating with just 54 milliion Naira.

To say the least, this presumptuous outburst of the CP was in my view, an act of gross manifestation of unethical disposition that was quite unbecoming of a public officer of his status. If the officer had drank, even in very small quantity, to that aphorism of DIG Nkana, he would have realised that his act of indiscretion could cause an incalculable damage to the integrity and selfless attributes of Police service in Nigeria. In a service where the pension of a retired CP is not up to a 100k, what message was CP Adeoye sending to those still in service? Wasn’t for them to embark on a rabid pursuit of money at all costs in order to secure their post service life? And in that case, how wouldn’t these officers then compromise the sacred policing ethics by monetizing their services to the detriment of the masses and the security of the nation?

I think retiring senior officers need to now be compelled to submit their valedictory addresses to the police authorities for vetting and possible censorship of any damaging content thereof, in order to prevent the recurrence of an embarrassing absurdity of this nature. A stitch in time, saves nine!

My name remains Dauda Adesina Joki-Lasisi esq.

By Lasisi Olagunju

One day, I will have the courage to ask the immaculate Ooni of Ife, Oba Enitan Ogunwusi, how he feels each time he travels on the horrible Ibadan-Ife road. Ben Okri, ‘The Famished Road’ storyteller, finds his own ‘road’ a torment – he says it “leads home and then away from it, without end.” Okri thinks the road a torment because he meets it “with too many signs and no direction.” The Ife-Ibadan road has signs, it has directions – and I find them very treacherously significant because they interlock fingers while road users lose life and limbs. The road has signs and directions to the very bowel of hell.

Olojo, the guardian divinity of the House of Oduduwa, is the famed owner of two machetes: with one machete, he prepares the field for the plants of tomorrow; with the other, he clears the road for prosperity (Ó fì’kan sán’ko/ Ó fì kan yè’nà). Those weapons must either now be blunt or lost. An Odu Ifa tells us something about Ile Ife and roads. It affirms that well-paved open roads start from Ile Ife. That affirmation today can only be treated on the operating theatre of irony. Could it be that truth has an expiry date and Ogbe’s truth of good, open roads in Ile Ife has expired? What we see today from the capital of Yorubaland (Ibadan) to the historical source of Yoruba people is the torment of a closed road that mocks the pathfinder-spirit of Oduduwa. The road does worse with its gaping craters and their threats of morphing into greater gullies. And it is a federal road.

Has the Ooni ever told the president that the worst road in the universe leads to his kingdom? Has he told the president that the N79.8 billion contract for the reconstruction of Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa road awarded in September, 2019 by his friend and villa mate, Muhammadu Buhari, has remained a contract for ghosts? Has he invited the president’s attention to the truth that since last year when he took over, the road has sunk even deeper in the mire of decrepitude? And, that even FERMA, a perennially rich agency that pretends giving palliatives on federal roads, has since seen the futility of stitching this rag? Or could it be that Kabiyesi does what our presidents since 1999 do – escaping road users’ pains by flying over our heads?

The reigning culture here is rooted in the ragged soils of our toil. I admit that badness is not peculiar to the Ife-Ibadan-Ilesa road. It is a national affliction that can’t be cured because of the greed of doctors who treat sick roads with fake and expired drugs.

We work hard to build roads that wear out before they are inaugurated. We have the interminable construction mess called Lagos-Ibadan Expressway. When did construction start there? When will it end – if it will ever end? How much have we sunk there? And, is it not a shame that the road is ready already for corrective surgery even before its makers are done making it? If you are a woman, and you are pregnant and your doctor tells you dancing is a ‘safe and fun way to exercise’, do not dance to the break beats of that road. It is made for abortion.

Ben Okri says “all roads lead to death” and “some roads lead to things which can never be finished.” Is that why our federal government’s roads are forever ongoing, none is ever finished or completed? Federal government’s statistics says out of Nigeria’s national road network of 200,000 kilometers, 36,289 km belong to it. Now, you ask Abuja which of its other roads, apart from the one from the Villa to Abuja airport, is good? Ask them why almost all roads that wear federal tags suffer neglect, abandonment or crass abuse.

My NYSC journey to the far north 34 years ago was on the Ibadan-Ilorin-Jebba-Mokwa-Yauri road. It was an experience in pleasantness. It is, today, a monument to frustration, a shrine to demons that feed on losses -human and material. The Ibadan-Oyo-Ogbomoso part of that road is one major reason why Nigeria should not have a federal government – or have roads managed by the Federal Government. There should be a coroner’s inquest on why that road was killed and who killed it. Without the states, the vehicle of Nigeria would have long lost its chassis. States keep doing what heart surgeons do when arteries are found blocked. They create bypasses, byways. A brand new 78-kilometre Iseyin-Ogbomosho road has just been built by Seyi Makinde’s Oyo State to escape the Federal Government’s death trap along that axis. A commenter online wrote: “The road has helped us to link northern Nigeria without using the dangerous Oyo-Ilorin road that has consumed so many lives…” The Oyo-Ilorin road of death spoken of here belongs to the government in Abuja.

Potholes jolt us to appreciate what bad roads represent in our lives. They tell us why the tyres of our country never last and why our rides are forever bumpy. Asking questions on why our roads are perennially bad is living the times of Ayi Kwei Armah’s ‘Two Thousand Seasons’: “A thousand seasons wasted wandering amazed along alien roads, another thousand spent finding paths to the living way.” Like Ouroboros, the self-tail-devourer, Nigeria’s ‘alien roads’ cyclically keep consuming the ‘living way.’

It is time to pound yam for the household, the idler among us goes for the heaviest pestle. This is better said in Yoruba: Òle bàá tì, ó gb’ódó nlá. There are abandoned federal roads everywhere which directly affect millions of Nigerians, but the government has moved the money to a 700km super coastal highway that will cost N15.6 trillion. The first phase is 47 kilometres, starting somewhere and ending nowhere, at a cost of N1.06 trillion. Should I just say that that N1 trillion will start and complete the reconstruction of decrepit Ibadan-Ife-Ilesa Road (224km), Ilorin to Bida (244.9km) and Shagamu to Benin (492km) if wisdom wills? Even at an inflated cost of N1 billion per kilometre, our husbands will achieve these and will even ‘collect change’. And Tinubu would have become very popular with it. But he wants a white elephant and has moved our money to purchase it.

White elephants are always expensive! Poet and journalist, Mathew Wills, in his ‘The Original White Elephant’ defines ‘white elephant’ as “something excessive that turns out to be valueless.” James A. Robinson and Ragnar Torvik in 2005 published an interesting article about the third world and deliberate bad investments – they titled their article: ‘White Elephants’. In that piece, they hold that politicians around here would always go for “white elephants” as against “socially efficient projects” because “the political benefits are large compared to the surplus generated by efficient projects.” That piece says much more than this. It is published in the Journal of Public Economics 89 (2005: 197-210). I think you should read it.

‘The Stolen White Elephant’ by Mark Twain is an interesting story on the cost of investing in big, expensive loss centres. It is the story of a fictional Kingdom of Siam. A reviewer says Siam is blessed with a “national appetite for fraud”. Another says it has officers of “pompous assumption of infallibility and ridiculous inappropriate procedures.” The “pointless” story is about an expensive search for a stolen white elephant, a further loss of hundreds of thousands of dollars in compensation and the eventual discovery of the rotting corpse of the supposedly stolen animal. The story ends with the duped narrator celebrating the man who duped him. It ends as the man pronounces himself “a ruined man and a wanderer in the earth.” In Studies in American Humour, Peter Messent (1995) does a lot of justice to it in his ‘Keeping Both Eyes Open.’ The whole story sounds Nigerian; what Fela called “expensive shit.” But I can argue that though we wander today, the past was a better experience.

“How can you develop a country rapidly if you can’t get about it?” Sir Rex Niven, pre-independence Speaker of Northern Nigeria House of Assembly, asked that question 69 years ago in relation to the state of roads in Nigeria. On January 27, 1955, Riven was asked to brief the Royal African Society and the Royal Empire Society in London on “Recent Developments in Nigeria.” He gave a very detailed account of himself as a British participant in the affairs of a key component of the Nigerian federation. Sector by sector, he spoke about efforts and failures. He particularly spoke on roads which he described as “the most important of the great aspects of development.” He said as he was speaking (in 1955), Nigeria had over 30,000 miles of roads whereas in 1920, “she had hardly any at all.” Then he used Kabba (in present Kogi State) to illustrate what he was saying: “The first province I went to, the newly constituted Kabba Province, had exactly 4 miles of road…but when I left Kabba four years later, there were over 200 miles of road.” Thirteen years later, the same Niven, in retirement, told the Commonwealth section of the Royal African Society on 11 November, 1969 that Nigeria had 40,000 miles of quality roads. That figure was even in spite of the ongoing civil war. Now, you ask: Why are our golden years always in the past? The past was obviously better handled.

By Lanre Adewole

The name, Rauf Oladosu, will likely mean nothing to outsiders but it means the world to senior operatives of the Judiciary, especially heads of courts and agencies within the system.

He is the Special Assistant to the CJN, Justice Kayode Ariwoola on Budget Matters and his appointment, scope of influence and operations, have been causing ripples in the accounting and appropriation orbit of the system.

No, the appointment isn’t novel. Walter Onnoghen, the CJN, disgraced out of office by Muhammadu Buhari as President, made a heavy weather of the office, by appointing a Professor to man it, for the time his aborted tenure lasted. Popularly known as Dr. Collins, the University of Nigeria, Nsukka lecturer was something close to the overseer of budgeting in the Judiciary, to the discomfort of several accounting officers of the 12 courts and agencies, that make up the federating units of the arm of government, especially in the early days of his involvement. It was the first time such enhanced hands would be ruffling financial equations within the system.

As much as the senior lecturer was disdained by some top operatives, who must now answer to the CJN, through him, practically nobody queried his profile and professional pedigree as unfitting for the job. He left when his boss’s job was undone by Buhari, I believe, back to Nsukka. He was a jolly fellow I will always reference a friend.

The Tanko interregnum saw one of his numerous favour-seeking sons, play the role, of course, without impacts as father and sons were busy chasing crumbs even when the elephant was on their shoulders. History has Tanko’s mess, stored.

As of today, without the reintroduction of the suspended retirement leave, Ariwoola has exactly four months in office and for all the mostly justified sticks, blows, knocks and stones he has received over appointments, both administrative and judicial, one area he appears to have done it right, is fund management. An empirical evidence is both his enemies inside and outside, yet unable to link him with at least one financial scandal in the administration of billions of naira allocated to the system, through the National Judicial Council. He deserves commendation for being prudent and transparent with public money voted for the running of the system, (his security guys would however have to stop eating bread and water in office), just as knocks should be rained on him over his nepotistic appointments, especially his unbridled appetite for Iseyin-centrism and shamelessly keeping too much in the family.

Oladosu’s appointment is a study in contradiction. Of course, despite the wide age difference, he is known as years-long confidant of the CJN within the system; also family, and predictably, from Iseyin. Ariwoola loves his communal heritage too much, to even be pro-Oyo State. There is a story about him preferring the road to his Iseyin country home being tarred, instead of the one linking his Ibadan abode. I love culturally-minded people, only that they could be uncomfortably provincial, regardless of how well-educated they are.

Aside the nepotism angle, Rauf, who is now considered a political appointee till the expiration of Ariwoola’s tenure, was a Level 9 officer at the Federal Judicial Service Commission (FJSC), where he was the Budget Officer, before, as they would say, God buttered his bread and his kinsman became the CJN.

When placed side-by-side with his immediate predecessor, a professor, it is easy to rule Rauf out as lacking in the requisite pedigree and knowledge, to oversee the system’s entire budgetting, appropriation and spending, serving as the eyes and ears of the CJN.

But despite the misgivings, the lowly officer has done well with judiciary’s budget, getting it jacked up and ensuring due process. The evidence of this claim is the fact that no one, at least from the grumbling insiders, has accused CJN and his boy(s), including a Senior Advocate from Iseyin who rules the privileges’ appointments (both legal and supreme court administration) of budget padding, despite the king-size grudge against the incumbent over his weakness.

That should be a plus for the argument that favours competence over seniority. By positional arrangement, thinking Rauf for the high-profile job, would be akin to the saying “kiniitanaja se kanlemomu” (how can one consider giving dog tigh to the imam when Islam forbids adherents from eating the animal). His now-proven ability and the merit he has shown on the job, would never have been known if Ariwoola hadn’t been wholly consumed by Iseyin-ism. Maybe nepotism isn’t that terribly bad on all sides as the dictionary meanings have projected, worsened by the negative optics of its usage, especially in relation to public service and grammatical applicability.

Maybe future allowances should be given when public service appointments favour family members and kinspeople of the appointors, especially when those without godfathers are also allowed to compete with the favoured, in open and transparent processes. The favoured, if they win fair, should also be weighed on performance and added-value basis, not who appoints them.

But that would never make up for what the constitution clearly calls abuse of office and use of office to confer personal advantage which is a criminal offence, under the law.

Rauf’s appointment, being a political one; meaning he is on secondment from FJSC, hasn’t offended any known law. His apparent capacity on the job, is also a recommendation, for future consideration for higher assignment. But asking his hitherto 12 bosses across the system, to be answerable to him, in the name of being Special Assistant to the ultimate boss, can’t be morally and emotionally right and a sure recipe for more angst against the CJN.

The Rauf scenario and the ill-wind it’s breeding, is a pointer to Ariwoola’s lack of experience as a manager of men. Of course, like Onnoghen and several CJNs before him, Ariwoola never managed any court or agencies of the judiciary, before fate thrust him to the zenith, where everyone now answers to him. His provincialism isn’t helping. It is the same challenge his imminent successor, KudiratKekere-Ekun would be confronting. She also never managed any court as CJ or headed any judicial agency and she will start administering all, in four months, from now. Yes, she has been the vice chairman of NJC since the combative Musa Dattijo Muhammad exited, statutorily heading appointment/promotion, constitution review and finance committees of the Council, but the position counts for nothing if the big man doesn’t fancy you. Dattijo was there and left a bitter man.

It is dangerous for the judiciary to keep appointing men and women without any experience in resource management as CJN. The groundswell of systemic opposition to Ariwoola today, is due to both his greed, and administrative inexperience. Instead of thrusting the manifestly-capable Rauf, who he says he trusts, forward, to boss his bosses with the expected cataclysmic fight-back, an experienced administrator would hide an asset like that as a secret weapon against systemic rot, keeping his subordinates guessing, when he, deemed an ignorant boss, is consistently a step ahead of their shenanigans.

But now, Ariwoola has exposed what Yoruba say an elder should hide under the agidi leaves while eating the cold pap.

To get the CJN now, all his teaducers need is get Rauf, who I learnt is already wearing shoulder-pads in dealing with those who would remain his bosses when the CJN is done and he would be compelled to revert to his FJSC role, maybe now, with promotion to Level 15 as being expected, going by precedents. To help the one who catapulted him to relevance, Rauf must keep his head on his shoulders and stay away from Greek gift. As a friend will joke, awufu dey run belle.

Ariwoola’s chapter in Nigeria’s judiciary is already inked, in the minds of both the reasonable and the unreasonable. He is generally perceived as a man who can’t stop taking for his own, like owambe women who would collect free party jollof packs even for their cats and dogs. It reflects poorly on him as someone called on by fate for a national assignment. But his poor judgement in appointment, also produced a Rauf. How then do we reconcile this, for posterity to make an objective call?

By Chidi Anselm Odinkalu

Senior Nigerian public officers are notoriously parsimonious with their recall once out of office. From among their club, memoirs are unusual. In a country ruled by whim, risk aversion is prudent when you are out of power. By feigning amnesia, yesterday’s men limit the likelihood that their successors may remember them for the wrong reasons. Moreover, with government as the principal guarantor of a good life, respect for the its rule of Omerta is the only way to retain any hope of access to its revolving doors.

When it occurs, departure from this trend is usually enforced. This is why Mohammed Bello Adoke’s 2019 memoirs remain notable. Adoke, a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, (SAN), was Attorney-General and Minister of Justice under President Goodluck Jonathan for five years from 2010 until 2015. Since leaving office, he has endured exile, detention, and a failed criminal trial in connection with the infamous Oil Prospecting Lease (OPL) 245 granted in April 1998 by General Abacha to the shadowy Malabu Oil and Gas Limited.

Even before his trial began, Adoke felt called upon discharge a burden in relation to the controversies that dogged him after office. Fittingly, his story is published under the title: Burden of Service. The sub-title Reminiscences of Nigeria’s Former Attorney-General, underscores the point that Adoke is, remarkably, the first former Attorney-General of the Federation to publish an account from his time in office. In addition to the Malabu Oil controversy, Burden of Service also offers insights into many other highlights of the Goodluck Jonathan years, including the hand-over of Bakassi Peninsula to Cameroon, recovery of the endless Abacha Loot, the removal of Ayo Salami as President of the Court of Appeal, and the climactic denouement to Nigeria’s 2015 presidential elections. In the afterglow of what he must regard as judicial vindication, it is timely to re-examine Adoke’s own narration.

While his parochial account is interesting in and of itself, it is the vignettes he offers when he is not necessarily pleading his own cause that make Adoke’s insights deserving of attention. A general theme of his is the shiftiness of Nigerian politicians and he illustrates this with several issues in the book. Some deserve scrutiny.

The first is the currency of loyalty in Nigerian politics. Under General Abacha, politicians popularised “I am loyal” as cult greeting. It is not lost on those interested that anyone who has need to repeat affirmations in this way probably knows nothing about loyalty in the first place. Illustrating this point, Adoke narrates how many people close to President Jonathan donated money to support the campaign of General Muhammadu Buhari in 2015. According to him, “many of my cabinet colleagues, including those known to be close to the President, had made donations to Buhari’s campaign. Those involved included heads of agencies. A Principal Officer of the National Assembly from the PDP was to later confess publicly that he donated N5 million to the APC during the elections.”

This shiftiness is not limited to politics; it also extends to high matters of constitutional legality. This is the second highlight from Burden of Service. Adoke tells a remarkable story about the fate of the Constitution (Fourth Amendment) Bill of 2015, which was said to have failed to receive presidential assent before President Jonathan vacated office. The amendment included clauses granting immunity to law-makers, life pension to former presiding officers of the National Assembly and inducting them into life membership of the National Council of State. It also contained a provision dispensing with presidential assent to constitutional amendments. As Adoke recalls, after the 2015 election, the National Assembly transmitted the Bill to President Jonathan for his assent. By the time Adoke learnt of this, President Jonathan had reportedly assented to the bill and authorized for it to be returned to the National Assembly. So, Adoke raced to the presidency to explain to the President the dangers inherent in the provisions contained in the amendment he assented to. After his encounter with President Jonathan, “the President looked genuinely surprised and promptly withdrew his assent”, whereupon he directed the Attorney-General “to prepare a memorandum elucidating all the issues…. raised and why he would have to veto the bill.” The rest is history but an important constitutional question arises – can a president having assented to a law unilaterally withdraw his assent?

Thirdly, there is the issue of weaponisation of litigation against the public purse in judgment debts. It’s best to render this in Adoke’s own words: “Many of the claims were bogus but since it was an organized scam, they were getting away with it…. Again, there were too many people interested in judgment debts. We were getting calls from all manner of people, including members of the National Assembly. Actually, some National Assembly members were making appropriation for judgment debts based on an understanding with the debtors (sic). It was a conspiracy against the national treasury.” This does not require any translation but it is noteworthy that Attorney-General Adoke chose not to tell who “they” were.

Fourth, there is the matter of plea bargains in white collar crimes involving politically exposed persons (PEPs) in Nigeria. About this, Adoke tells the story of the presidential pardon granted former Bayelsa State Governor, Diprieye Alamieyeseigha. According to him, Alamieyeseigha’s conviction was under a plea bargain and “as part of the plea bargain he was to be granted presidential pardon by (President Umaru) Yar’Adua after his release from jail. This, however, did not materialize as President Yar’Adua fell ill and died.” Plea bargains are subject to approval by courts and it’s doubtful whether this part of the deal was disclosed to any court. It certainly wasn’t disclosed to Nigerians.

Fifth, as Attorney-General of the Federation, Adoke was also the official leader of the Bar. His memoir offers an unusual insight into how he views hierarchies at the Bar. To make this point, he tells the story of how, before his time, “a substantial part of the budgetary allocation made for solicitors’ fees was being paid out only to two or three private solicitors. There was a case of a former Attorney-General that was paying a Senior Advocate N50 million for each case….” The result was there was insufficient money to go round and many cases against government went un-defended, leading to more judgment debts. So, how did Adoke address this? He decided that “no SAN would be paid more than N5 million for a brief; any other lawyer, who was not a SAN, would receive a maximum of N2 million.” In the un-complicated calculus of Attorney-General Adoke, a SAN is worth 250% of a non-SAN!

The narration in Burden of Service unfolds at four distinct levels of pre-text, text, context, and sub-text. It is replete with claims of moral high ground and completeness of disclosure but – as with nearly all memoirs – the reader must have an eye for both the credible and the incredulous. The line between these two can sometimes be non-existent in Adoke’s mind.

In telling the story of the removal of Ayo Salami as the President of the Court of Appeal, for instance, Adoke prefaces his narration with the implicit disclaimer that “the Attorney-General is not a member of the National Judicial Council (NJC)”, who recommended the retirement of Salami. He then proceeds to a pro-forma narration that is half-hearted to the point of being manifestly disingenuous.

According to Adoke, Salami “had personally encouraged” him to apply for SAN. However, Chief Justice Katsina-Alu, who was the other party in this terminal dog-fight with Salami, was his “mentor and adopted father” and benefactor, who personally recommended him to President Jonathan for the position of Attorney-General. Why it should fall to the Chief Justice of the Federation to nominate the Attorney-General of the Federation is another matter altogether. It is difficult to escape the conclusion that in this part of the book, at least, Adoke was – to put it rather mildly – less than economical with the truth.

A lawyer and a teacher, Odinkalu can be reached at [email protected]. An earlier version of this article was first published in October, 2019.