Supreme Court Judge Nomination: Access to Justice wants NJC to disclose inquiry status into petition against Justice Uwa

Justice Chidiebere Uwa 

A Lagos-based rights group, Access to Justice (AJ), has called on the National Judicial Council (NJC), to make public, its inquiry status into the petition alleging Justice Chidiebere Uwa, Justice of the Court of Appeal and nominee for Supreme Court Justice, may have abused her office as a judge and violated the Code of Conduct for Judicial Officers.

It would be recalled that last year, upon noting the name of Justice Uwa, was among those shortlisted by the Federal Judicial Service Commission (FJSC) for consideration by the National Judicial Council (NJC) for recommendation as a Supreme Court Justice, AJ had written to the NJC, requesting the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN) to review the allegations made some years ago against Justice Uwa, then a High Court Judge of Abia State, alleging abuses of office and determine whether it is appropriate to offer the judge, a position on Nigeria’s highest court.

According to a statement signed by the Convener of the group, Joseph Otteh, it stated that “In 2005, one Dr G. C. Duru, then Chairman of Abia South Local Government wrote a petition against Hon. Justice Chidiebere Uwa, then a High Court Judge, alleging extortion, bribery, and intimidation against her. 

“Access to Justice further made representations to the NJC asking it to inquire into the allegations, and, after many reminders, the NJC finally declined to make known the results of its investigation, saying they were classified.

“Doubting that the NJC conducted any investigation into the complaint, given particularly that the original author of the complaints said, at the time, that the NJC never called him to come forward with the evidence, including bank tellers showing the transactions he claimed he had taken place, Access to Justice made further representations to the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Offences Commission (ICPC) asking the Commission to conduct investigations into the allegations by the Petitioner. 

“After two years, the ICPC determined that it could not take further action on the matter, given, in its words, that while there was ‘actus reus’ on the part of Hon. Justice Uwa, there was no ‘mens rea’ on her part to commit the offence. 

“However, a remarkable finding of the ICPC was that Hon. Justice Uwa indeed solicited funds from the petitioner on behalf of FIDA, although the Commission said there was no evidence that the funds were transferred to FIDA. 

“The fuller narrative of this story is contained in an excerpt from The Justice Observatory Journal, pub. by Access to Justice (2009, vol. 6) attached to this advisory.

“Last year, Access to Justice requested the NJC to investigate whether, given the preceding narrative above, Hon. Justice Uwa had not grievously violated the Code of Conduct for Judicial Officers, and whether she was, in the circumstances, a fitting candidate for appointment to the Supreme Court of Nigeria, Nigeria’s highest court. 

“Up until this time, the NJC has not provided Access to Justice a response. This is why Access to Justice has now followed up with a reminder to the NJC.” 

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