By Lanre Adewole
In a nail-biter last Wednesday, the Supreme Court handed a narrow defeat to the deposed Emir of Gwandu, Al-Mustapha Haruna Jokolo, in his 20-year judicial criss-cross to regain his lost kingdom and paradisiacal influence as a first-class traditional ruler in Kebbi State and North as a whole.
The slim win -gifted the appointing and dismissing authority, the state government and the incumbent Gwandu traditional head, Muhammadu Illiyasu Bashar, by the majority of the Bench’s panel that eventually interred the matter, roused and split the North, with its elite siding either ways on the controversial ruling and the involved dramatic personae, as decades-old relationships dictate.
One unmissable post-ruling intervention uncharacteristically came from immediate president, Muhammadu Buhari, openly siding with the incumbent Emir, his long-standing friend and coursemate in the military, against Jokolo, his “boy” and former Aide-de-camp, when he was military head of state between December 31 1983 and August 27, 1985. The two-time Nigerian leader is no doubt a life-long nepotist in his Arewa-centrism, but he has also shown capacity to be aso tun sosi ma ba ibi kan je (adept at balancing act), especially in two-fightings in which he doesn’t want to be seen taking sides.
He kept the eccentric EFCC czar, Ibrahim Magu in office for over five years in acting capacity, knowing full well he was wanted out by his kitchen cabinet led by then-powerful secret service boss, the bearded Lawan Daura. He even had both feted in villa and shared Jumat prayer mat with them on April 21, 2017 as their animosity raged. The gladiators even shook hands in what appeared an armistice, only for Daura, after the “peace talks” to cause another damning security report to doom Magu’s chances of getting senate confirmation as the substantive chair of the anti-graft agency.
While the Magu drama painted Buhari as not being in the driver’s seat of his government, there was a positive posture of him as a due process leader, despite one of the gladiators being a rumored relative and the other, administration’s anti-corruption poster boy. But in the Gwandu royal rumble, he came out swinging against the man once chosen to lay his life for him as his ADC, calling his lawfare against the incumbent a distraction, as quoted by his forever-media aide Garba Shehu. Hear the former president; “You (Bashar) have always worked for the betterment of your people and the nation, even under those circumstances, I hope you will continue to promote peace, happiness and prosperity of the people in Gwandu Emirate and beyond. I thank Allah for this victory and pray for your long life and good health”.
As reported by NAN, Mr. Buhari spoke from London, which means it was a priority errand for Mr. Shehu. If Buhari is still this attached to the case out of office, it is better left to imagination how much help his friend must have received from him while he was the Commander-in-Chief of Nigeria.
A senior lawyer from the North, Barrister Aminu Usman, generously provided me a context to Buhari’s one-sidedness.
“Muhammadu Iliyasu Bashar as a retired General is Buhari’s military cadet school classmate. Jokolo was Buhari’s ADC. Buhari could only make amends to his classmate as it was Buhari’s influence (and Sambo Dasuki) with Abacha that catapulted Jokolo over Muhammad Iliyasu Bashar to get Jokolo on to the Emirship. Once Jokolo was dethroned, they made sure Iliyasu got onto the throne” the gentleman lawyer enlightened.
It is likely Jokolo had spurned his former boss’s admonition to let go. So why not the “yegede” (we told you so) taunt when the former “boy” was floored. Even old men are allowed to be child-like petty, once in a while.
It is certainly going to be a while before dust will finally settle in the Jokolo judgement considering the region-wide interest it is generating and the rumblings in the justice sector over what is widely perceived as the triumph of technicality over sound interpretation of the law governing the making and the unmaking of Emirs in Kebbi State, as well as the power of deposition being exercised by governors across board. Aside Kano where the apex court is also expected to draw the curtains in the cousins’ feud over the ancient throne, what could pass for a mini-Arewa Spring against sitting traditional rulers is also stirring the Zazzau Emirate. The deposed Wazirin Zazzau, Ibrahim Muhammad–Aminu, has petitioned the Kaduna State House of Assembly, seeking reversal of the appointment of the 19th Emir of Zazzau, Ahmad Nuhu-Bamalli. In the petition sent to the Assembly speaker, Yusuf Dahiru–Liman, the former Waziri accused the immediate governor of the state, Nasir El-Rufai, of unlawfully installing Bamalli as Emir in November 2020 in violation of established traditions and state laws.
Both Jokolo and Nuhu-Bamali are 19th Emir of their emirates. Is the sun about setting for the Zazzau man too?
In a statement acknowledging his judicial defeat, Jokolo called out unnamed Judases who allegedly doomed his return to the throne, after two judicial victories at the lower courts. Can President Buhari be pinned in this [accusation]? He cursed some and predicted their imminent shame. Beyond his grief, his statement was timely, considering that the recent malaise ailing Supreme Court pronouncements was close to full manifestation before his defeat confirmation burned it out.
Unlike years of yore when Supreme Court answered its final court name in bold printing of granted reliefs, precision in orders made and great articulation of jurisprudence interpretations in ways difficult for jobbers and lobbyists to spin, the apex court these days, leaves issues brought for determination more intractable with cloudy pronouncements and very jumbled orders, so much so that feuding parties leave the court simultaneously claiming victory. It was so for Labour Party. Even after Supreme Court ruled on its leadership crisis, no clear leader still emerged.
Multiple personalities still parade themselves as the lawful national chairman. Same for the PDP on its national secretaryship. Before Jokolo’s admittance, the information highway was getting saturated with his reinstatement. Can the apex court embrace better clarity next time? Most of the affected cases are political, involving the opposition, but nothing is being assumed here even as the disturbing pattern persists. Being the final court, the finality in its pronouncements must be nuanced enough for parties to know where they stand.
As the traditional institution and political leadership continue to knock heads over the latter’s assumed power to depose, a brilliant op-ed by Mr. Usman, with intrinsic historical insight, will be a great material for constitutional historians and progressive political leaders to engage conversations that could defrost throne tension, especially in Northern Nigeria.
Here is an excerpt; “An examination of the Chiefs (Appointment and Deposition) Law will show that it made provisions only on procedure for appointment of Chiefs. No provisions are made in the Law for (a) complaints and petitions on a wrong selection procedures or outcome that culminated in an appointment, to provide for challenge of the outcome before the appointment is made, and (b) no provision is made for a fair internal administrative dispute resolution procedure, before deposition or dethronement or after a person has been removed from office. Thus, is the Supreme Court stepping into the shoes of the State House of Assembly to make that legislative provision in the State Law?”
If there is no provision for internal administrative dispute resolution, on what pedestal was the majority of the apex court panel expecting Jokolo to stand, in exploring the option, the absence of which the court said dealt his reclamation effort a fatal blow.
Hear Usman again, “The Supreme Court concluded that non-exhaustion of the internal administrative dispute resolution procedure for challenging the removal, ousted the jurisdiction of the State High Court and as a result the State High Court has no jurisdiction to entertain the suit brought by HRH Mustapha Jokolo against his dethronement as Emir of Gwandu. This is a surprising decision of the Supreme Court in the face of its subsisting decisions on interpretation of Section 6 of the Constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria 1999 (as amended) on judicial powers and Section 250 that confers exclusive and unlimited jurisdiction on the
State High Court. The Supreme Court has, in interpreting these provisions, held that no administrative requirement made in legislation may derogate or oust the exclusive and unlimited jurisdiction of the High Court. Here is the Supreme Court now saying non-exhaustion of internal administrative dispute procedure ousts the jurisdiction of the State High Court”.
It is concerning enough for the justice system that Jokolo’s judicial journey took 9 years at the high court, two at the court of appeal, Sokoto division and another nine at the apex court.
Proverbs 13:12 says, “Hope deferred makes the heart sick”. Jokolo was 33 years when terminated by the military government of IBB, succeeded his “53 suitcases” father ten years later, then terminated from the throne at 53. Now he is 73. Even if reinstated, he would be just a symbolic leader, considering that the piquancy that comes with youthfulness is long gone. His so-long-a journey in Nigerian courts is a tragic summation of the catastrophe of the snail-speed justice system. As rumoured, even if some conspiracy “delayed” his case file in the dockets of the two courts where it spent a cumulative of 18 years; that should make it more worrisome that someone of his reach could get that cancelled. What hope then for ordinary Nigerians? Judiciary must reform itself and it is clear now that at least regional if not state, Supreme Courts are as exigent as state police.
About three weeks before the Jokolo judgement fiasco, precisely on May 16, professor of Law, Senior Advocate and Nigeria’s immediate vice president, Yemi Osinbajo delivered an uncharacteristic stinging rebuke to the Supreme Court over its sloppiness and flip-flop in the interpretation of constitutional issues, leading to confusion in jurisprudential application of precedents, as the apex court keeps creating multiple precedents for individual cases where it was supposed to chart a path for lower courts. Barrister Usman has just pointed out the precedent inconsistency in the Gwandu case.
Osinbajo, delivering a keynote address at the 2025 NBA Yenagoa Branch, listed multiple examples of the apex court derailing from precedents.
Today, 23 days after his slashing analysis on the frightening drop in the quality of judgements coming from the ultimate court, the lords of the apex bench led by the Chief Justice should be huddling at an emergency retreat, seeking ways to halt the skid into notoriety.
The views expressed by contributors are strictly personal and not of Law & Society Magazine.
