By Bukola Olasanmi
The drug trafficking allegations against the presidential candidate of the All Progressives Congress (APC), Bola Tinubu, have continued to generate interests in the country as foremost public interest lawyer, Barrister Frank Tietie, has stated that he has no confidence in the judiciary to prosecute Tinubu despite compelling evidence of his drug links in the United States.
Tietie who is the Executive Director of Citizens Advocacy for Social & Economic Rights (CASER) said in an interview recently that this development may have discouraged lawyers to take up the case against the former Governor of Lagos state.
According to him “I did not have sufficient confidence that the court will entertain such a matter in good faith on the grounds that we don’t have a course of action or the court itself may not assume jurisdiction on the grounds that we lack locus standi (the right or capacity to bring an action or to appear in a court).”
He said further that such cases tend to frustrate lawyers. Lamenting that “we have been sorely disappointed by our past attempts to address public interest issues through the court. I have now resolved that until certain individuals or strong groups take interest in such matters to the point that they approach us, I will not take it up.”
He said lawyers might not have the legal rights to prosecute such cases since they are neither candidates in any of the elections nor members of any of the political parties.
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He said the course of action is the set of facts that will invoke the jurisdiction of the court’s power to hear such matter and make a pronouncement.
Tietie added that lawyers have been disappointed by its past attempts to address public interest issues through the court.
“This is politics, politics in Nigeria, even though many people don’t want to acknowledge it, has been reduced to ‘what is in it for me. What can I get to my benefit?’
“So, if groups and individuals do not yet see how much financial, material or political benefits that can come to them from getting engaged in such matter, they won’t do it” he said.
On the recent recent allegations of vote buying plot made by the Coalition of United Political Parties (CUPP) against the APC, Tietie said it remained an allegation.
“There are two things that are expected, first, a sincere coalition like CUPP will submit a report to INEC simultaneously with that press briefing, which means they are holding INEC accountable to the people and going back to the people to inform them that they have made INEC become aware, with pieces of evidence and not just wide allegations without substantiated evidence.
“Because making that press statement without submitting evidence to the people or to the journalists present to analyze and evaluate the veracity of such allegations simply makes it another political comment.”
He said the best thing will be that the allegations should have been made before INEC, then the burden will now fall on INEC to discharge it to the extent that it will either confirm it to be true or not and even if it is not either of the two, it should give reassurance that such a thing cannot happen.