Allegation made by Kano Election Petition Tribunal Chairman, Judge Flora Azinge, that a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) attempted to bribe her with N10 billion has been taken up by the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) for investigation and sanction if proven.<\/p>\n
\u201cA Senior Advocate of Nigeria who has a pending case before me is attempting to bribe me. Money has been flying in this tribunal since yesterday. Whoever collects money on my behalf, God will punish that person and his generation yet unborn \u2013 to the fourth generation,\u201d Azinge announced in open court on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
\u201cThey keep abusing judges, insulting us every day in the papers, in the media \u2013 that we are taking bribes .\u2026 Let me repeat again that nobody should approach me with money again. I\u2019m contented with what God has given me, and I have a roof over my head.\u201d<\/p>\n
Arinze later clarified her statement as follows:<\/p>\n
\u201cWhat I said was that there is an allegation that money is transferred to the account of an orderly of one of us and a tribunal staff by a lawyer. The said staff is currently under investigation on this matter.<\/p>\n
\u201cA lawyer attempted to bring meat for me during the Eid-El Kabir celebration which I declined and cautioned him that it is unethical.\u201d<\/p>\n
The NBA Section on Public Interest and Development Law (NBA-SPIDEL) asked Azinge to name the culprit and has set up a panel of three members to investigate the allegation and submit a report within 10 days.<\/p>\n
The Section described as \u201cshameless characters\u201d senior lawyers who offered the bribe to pervert justice.<\/p>\n
It condemned the unethical act and commended Azinge by disclosing the attempt to bribe her and compromise the tribunal, according to a statement issued by NBA-SPIDEL Chairman John Aikpokpo-Martins and Secretary Funmi Adeogun.<\/p>\n
\u201cInformation that has gone viral on social media indicates that \u2026 Azinge, the Chairman of the National and State Houses of Assembly Election Tribunal in Kano State, in an unprecedented manner expressed displeasure and anger in the open court when she alleged that a Senior Advocate appearing before the tribunal attempted to bribe her to pervert the course of justice,\u201d the statement said.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe \u2026 Chairman was quoted to have particularly stated thus \u2018A Senior Advocate of Nigeria who has a pending case before me is attempting to bribe me. Money has been flying in this tribunal since yesterday.<\/p>\n
\u2018\u201cWhoever collects money on my behalf, God will punish that person and his generation yet unborn \u2013 to the fourth generation. They keep abusing Judges, insulting us every day in the papers, in the media \u2013 that we are taking bribe. Let me repeat again that nobody should approach me.\u201d\u2019<\/p>\n
\u201cSPIDEL commends [Azinge] for voicing out the fact that attempts have been made by a Senior Advocate to bribe and by extension compromise the tribunal; and more importantly, that money has been shamelessly flying around in the tribunal for some time.<\/p>\n
\u201cSPIDEL strongly condemns these evil practices and attempts to compromise the integrity of the tribunal by unscrupulous legal practitioners.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt must be stated that attempts to bribe Judges and pervert justice are not only criminal in nature but also amounts to infractions of the Rules of Professional Conduct.<\/p>\n
\u201cAny lawyer who engages in attempts to compromise the integrity of the court or any of its officers is a disgrace and an embarrassment to the legal profession.<\/p>\n
\u201cBy the Rule 1 of the extant Rules of Professional Conduct for Legal Practitioners 2007, it is incumbent upon every lawyer to uphold and observe the rule of law, promote and foster the cause of justice, maintain a high standard of professional conduct and not engage in any conduct which is unbecoming of a legal practitioner.<\/p>\n
\u201cLawyers, as officers of the court, are obliged not to conduct themselves in any manner that may obstruct, delay, or adversely affect the due administration of justice<\/p>\n
Azinge urged to produce evidence of allegation<\/p>\n
\u201cSPIDEL is of the considered opinion, therefore, that it is not sufficient for [Azinge] to cry out, as she has courageously done. [She] is obliged, therefore, as a member of the legal profession, to give names of the shameless characters to substantiate her allegations,\u201d the statement added, per reporting by BarristerNG.com.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt is only in doing this that [Azinge] would have fully discharged the moral and ethical burden placed on her.<\/p>\n
\u201cSPIDEL notes, unfortunately, that the Honourable Chairman has sought to modify her earlier statement, and we hope that this modification is not arising from pressures on her. To keep silent is to enable malfeasance and perpetuate irresponsible behaviour.<\/p>\n
\u201cMay we reiterate that the later modification of the earlier statement of the Honourable Chairman of Tribunal is very surprising and confusing.<\/p>\n
\u201cSPIDEL is willing and ready to take this matter up to ensure that the said Senior Advocate is made to face the wrath of the law as a scapegoat. We would not be satisfied except the Senior Advocate is called out by [Azinge].<\/p>\n
\u201cWe, therefore, call on the Honourable Chairman, Honourable Justice Flora Azinge, to boldly and courageously disclose the name of the Senior Advocate and other senior lawyers (if any) involved in this scandalous attempt to compromise the integrity of the tribunal.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis call is expedient and the grant of same by the Honourable Chairman is imperative to enable SPIDEL do the needful in accordance with her mandate and in furtherance of the objectives of the Rules of Professional Conduct in the Legal Profession, which make it a duty upon every lawyer to report every infraction of the RPC to the Legal Practitioners Disciplinary Committee.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe nation is watching as the legal profession is now in the eye of the storm by the allegations. We owe ourselves the sacred duty to protect the nobility of the legal profession, maintain the sanctity of our courts, and defend the integrity of the judiciary.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn the light of the above, SPIDEL hereby constitutes a team to investigate these allegations. The team is made up of:<\/p>\n
\u201cKunle Edun (Warri Branch)
\n\u201cYakubu S. Bawa (Jos Branch)
\n\u201cAbiye Tam-George (Lagos Branch)
\n\u201cThe team is expected to submit a report to SPIDEL within the next 10 days.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Allegation made by Kano Election Petition Tribunal Chairman, Judge Flora Azinge, that a Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN) attempted to bribe her with N10 billion has been taken up by the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) for investigation and sanction if proven. \u201cA Senior Advocate of Nigeria who has a pending case before me is attempting […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":3371,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3370","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-latest-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3370","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3370"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3370\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3372,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3370\/revisions\/3372"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/3371"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3370"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3370"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peoplesforumonline.com.ng\/about\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3370"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}