A Special Assistant on Public Communications to the 2023 Presidential candidate of the Peoples Democratic Party, Atiku Abubakar, Phrank Shaibu, has commended the United States District Court of Illinois, over the judgement on President Bola Tinubu’s Chicago State University documents.
Shaibu who stated this while reacting to the order by Justice Nancy Maldonado for the Chicago State University to release all of Tinubu’s academic records to Atiku, claimed that the independence of the judiciary in the US led to Tinubu’s ultimate defeat at the court.
According to him, the President had continued to evade justice since 1999 when the late human rights lawyer, Gani Fawehinmi SAN, first made his certificates scam known to the public knowledge.
Shaibu alleged that judges had also continued to give Tinubu victory based on technicalities, rather than given judgement on merits, a development which he claimed had led to over 20 dubious victories.
According to him, it was unfortunate that the Nigerian judiciary had failed to live up to expectations as the last hope of the common man.
“Justice Maldonado who has spent less than one year on the bench and who sat on this case for barely a month, has been able to do what the Nigerian judiciary could not do for 23 years.
“This explains why the Nigerian society is on the brink of slipping into the state of nature, which Thomas Hobbes described as short, brutish, and nasty,” Shaibu said.
He however criticized Tinubu’s lawyer and former National Legal Adviser of the All Progressives Congress, Babatunde Ogala, who described the US court victory as of no consequence to the Supreme Court petition in Nigeria.
Ogala had compared the victory to masturbation, noting that the judgement would have no consequence on Atiku’s appeal against Tinubu’s victory at the Supreme Court.
Meanwhile, Shaibu who described Ogala as a legal and intellectual Lilliputian, asked the Head of Tinubu’s Legal Team to bury his face in shame.
“Ordinarily, we would not have responded to the words of a legal Lilliputian who has never won any landmark case in court and whose growth in the legal field is tied to the apron strings of a Chicago Bagman. However, the truth needs to be said for the sake of posterity.
“Louis Brandeis, US Supreme Court Judge may have had Ogala in mind when he wrote “…about the wickedness of people shielding wrongdoers and passing them off (or at least allowing them to pass themselves off) and then proposed a remedy that “If the broad light of day could be let in upon men’s actions, it would purify them as the sun disinfects.”
“It is unfortunate that Ogala glorifies technicality instead of justice. Ogala claimed that the victory was meaningless. So, why did his principal try to block the release of his credentials if he had nothing to hide? Why did he also appeal the initial judgment? The Bible says only the wicked run when no one chases them. Why has Tinubu been blocking the release of his academic records for nearly 30 years?” he added.
He however described Ogala’s outburst as a desperation to receive an appointment from Tinubu, having failed to make the cabinet.
“Ogala was lobbying to be the Attorney-General. He believed it was his birthright after defending Tinubu in court on several occasions. However, having only received the title of senior advocate two years ago without any remarkable or landmark cases under his belt, Tinubu opted for the more experienced Lateef Fagbemi.
“Since then, Ogala has been trying to ingratiate himself to Tinubu and is now standing logic on its head just to please his master. How pathetic!” he said.