THE refusal of the Cross River State Government to pay 29 magistrates in the state 26 months’ salary arrears is an unjust and undeserved assault on the judicial arm of government in the state. It is tantamount to erosion of the judiciary’s much avowed and cherished independence, a major requisite in a functioning democracy.
The state should fairly compensate its judicial officers. There is a link between adequate compensation of judges and the quality and independence of the judiciary. French political philosopher, Baron de Montesquieu, in his seminal work, ‘The Spirit of Laws’ (1748), argued that the best form of government is the one which ensures that legislative, executive and judicial powers are separate, and the three arms of government keep each other in check to prevent any arm from becoming too powerful, resulting in despotism. Every lover of democracy and good governance in Nigeria should therefore be genuinely outraged and disconcerted by that perfidious development in Cross River because no arm of government should be systematically weakened, deliberately or inadvertently, by the other in the performance of its statutory duties. Democracy and society are the worse for it.
According to media reports, the magistrates took to the streets in the state capital, Calabar, and marched to the office of the Governor, Benjamin Ayade, in January to protest when they were being owed 24 months’ salary arrears. The leader of the group and a Chief Magistrate, Solomon Abuo, said they suspended the first protest in January to allow the government to pay them. Sadly, that hope never materialised. “We have given the governor enough time and made some concessions which are four possible options on how to add us to the payroll system and pay us, but nothing is being done,” he lamented.
To the governor, it was not an issue deserving of the urgency of now to resolve. Now in the 26th month, it is ironical that this egregious affront on the last hope of the common man in the state is unfolding under the watch of Ayade, himself, a lawyer. This is most outrageous. How can a governor, the head of the executive arm of government in a state, be comfortable knowing that a critical segment of the judiciary is left vulnerable and susceptible to corrupt inducement, and compromising influences by the refusal to pay the salaries of magistrates? The greatest threat to justice is corruption. When judicial officers are left with the unnerving thought of looking for ways and means of survival because of the action or inaction of the executive, everybody must be concerned and rise to defend the temple of justice.
The judiciary is a critical institution of state tasked with the responsibility of dispensing justice without fear or favour, interpreting and applying the law as well as ensuring equity, law and order in the society. Any attempt to compromise these foundational functions forebodes ill for any democracy and should not be contemplated. One requirement for the performance of these functions is the impartiality of judges. How then can the Cross River magistrates maintain impartiality in the discharge of their judicial functions when the executive is recklessly kneeling on their necks?
The unfortunate ordeal of the magistrates reinforces the advocacy and clamour for the inclusion of the judiciary in the first line charge so that their optimal functioning will not depend on the whims and caprices of the executive. The refusal to pay the magistrates for that long period of time amounts to a serious attempt by the Ayade government to frustrate the independence of the judiciary in the state and make it a toy in his hands. This display of executive recklessness should be resisted.
Indeed, the trauma of the Cross River magistrates represents a metaphor for how the executive arm of government sees the judiciary in fragile democracies: an institution that can be pauperised through the deliberate weakening of its institutional capacity to operate optimally. This should not be so. The worst damage anyone can do to democracy is to bring the judiciary to the type of ridicule that Ayade is meting out to the magistrates in his state. The strategy seems straightforward: bring the judiciary to submission and executive control by owing the judges and magistrates. The wider ramifications and consequences of such a reality are too scary to contemplate, let alone experience.
The Nigeria Bar Association should show more than a passing interest in the unfolding show of shame in Cross River State. Its intervention and mobilisation should be more evident to save the image of the judiciary in the state. Ayade should be reminded of his solemn oath to discharge his duties to the people of Cross Rivers diligently and efficiently. It is therefore unconscionable to owe someone their salary for two years, let alone the striking magistrates in the state. A labourer deserves their wages. The governor should see the need to end the continued ‘weaponisation’ of poverty against the magistrates by paying their salaries without further delay. The goal should be a package that grants judges a sizeable and regular remuneration.
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