Chief Barrister Okoi Obono Obla is the Special Assistant to the President on Prosecution. In this interview with CHIDI MATTHEW NWACHUKWU, the legal luminary sheds light on the achievements recorded so far in the fight against crime and corruption, and on other sundry legal issues.Why did the president find you very qualified to do your job'Maybe because of my credentials as a long standing pro-democrat, an anti-corruption crusader and a legal practitioner who has fought the corrupt, rotten, bankrupt, social, political and economic order. And I have fought for social justice for the under-privileged, the dispossessed, the poor and what the Marxist Philosophy calls the Lumpen, that is, the chronically scandalously poor people who are completely disconnected from the oppressive super structure. I have spent 26 unbrokenyears in legal practice. I have practiced in the magistrates courts, in the high courts, in the courts of appeal, at the Supreme Court, and at election tribunals.Before now, were you ever involved in politics'Well, I will not call myself a politician, rather Ill call myself a professional in politics because Im not a typical Nigerian career politician. I came into politics because of the president. I admire him for what he stands for. Since 2003 when he started contesting, Ive been voting consistently for him, and in 2009 when he founded CPC, I was invited and made the national legal adviser. Then in our first national convention in 2011, I was elected deputy national secretary of the old CPC, and then in 2013, the president appointed me the secretary/member CPC Merger Committee, and the responsibility of that committee was to negotiate with ACN and other progressive parties towards the promotion of the National Round Party to wrestle power from the PDP.What will you say is your greatest achievement in your practice as a lawyer'In 2008, I won a landmark case that led to the removal from office of the former governor of Cross River State, Mr. LiyelImoke. Singlehandedly, I brought together a coalition ofopposition political parties who felt that the governorship election which took place on the 14th of April, 2007 was massively rigged, and on the 16th of July 2008, a Court of Appeal sitting in Calabar set aside that election. I was very glad. I beat my chest because the message was that impunity does not pay. And I fought that matter even though they recruited the best oflawyers.So, since you youve won so many landmark cases, did you ever press to become a Senior Advocate of Nigeria'Yes, I applied last year, but I was not selected, and I have applied again this year.Do you hope to be selected this year'Well, I have met the requirements stipulated by the guidelines, so I leave the rest to God.Maybe youre not playing the politics of SANSHIP very well'I dont believe that I should lobby to be a SAN if Ive met therequirements, I should be selected on merit. If it is about the celebration of excellence in the legal profession then why should I lobby' If I have met the basic requirements that every applicant should meet, thats enough.Now, that youre the Special Assistant to the president on prosecution, what will you say is your greatest achievement'The courts have been working very hard and we have been seeing convictions. About two weeks ago, we had the former governor of Adamawa State sent to jail, and recently too, two oil marketers were also convicted. The former General Manager of the Nigerian Maritime Administration and Safety Agency (NIMASA) was convicted. We have a lot of cases in court now against former political office holders, and the cases are going on very well. I believe in the next 6 months or 1 year, we are going to have a lot of convictions against politically exposed persons, unprecedented in the history of Nigeria. We are carrying out a lot of reforms in the Federal Ministry of Justice where Im attached. We have come out with a document known as National Policy on Prosecution, we have strategic plan on prosecution for 2016 to 2019. We also designed a code of conduct for prosecutors and guidelines for prosecutors. We have also crafted the Special Criminal Court Bill, the Bill of Money Laundering, and a lot of other things. We have also created the Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee (ACJMC) which I am the Acting Secretary, and it was inaugurated in February, 2016, and the role of that committee is to ensure that criminal cases are speedily and expeditiously heard, and to also decongest prisons, and to collate and analyze information from all the institutions involved with the Administration of Criminal Justice. We have carried out a lot of reforms, and like I said, we are still doing our best to clean up the Judiciary, and today we have justices of the Supreme Court and a judge of the Federal High Court standing trial. Those are all our interventions and efforts to make a clean break from the past.Your job is a very sensitive one, do you have any special allocation from the Presidency to manage your logistics and perform your duties'You know I am attached to the Federal Ministry of Justice, specifically to the Office of the Attorney General of the Federation. So whatever is given to the Attorney General of the Federation, I enjoy it too.So, you have abandoned private practice for now'Definitely. I cannot be working for government and be in private practice simultaneously.Do you intend to go back to private practice when you have finished your work as a public servant'Definitely, Im a lawyer and I love the job.And you dont have any plans of going into politics after youre done serving here'It is God who will decide that.What if you are called upon to serve in a political capacity'Why not' If Im called upon to take up a higher national responsibility, why not' I will.How much achievement have you recorded in the area of decongesting prisons, give statistics'Well, I cannot give you statistics. What we do is reducing prison population or congestion. It does not mean that I have to tell you that 50 prisoners have left Kuje Prison or Ilorin Prison. What we have done is to come out with strategic plans on how prisons can be decongested which we have done through the instrumentality of the new actThe Administration of Criminal Justice Act2015, which encourages quick trials. You know what is responsible for prison congestion is delay in criminal trials. For instance, someone is charged to court, and if the magistrate does not have jurisdiction, he will remand the person, pending when the Police would conclude investigation. So, we no longer have that situation because the ACJA 2015 has made provisions so that accused persons will not be remanded. If you want to remand an accused person now, you will have to follow the laid down procedures in the act.Talking about remanding of prisoners, do you have other provisions for non-custodial sentencing'Yes. In the act we have provisions for probation, non-custodial sentencing and settlements such as community service, compensation, damages, and so on. Even plea bargain is part of it, the essence of which is to allow the defendant come toagreement with the prosecution, and the plea agreement is taken to the magistrate or judge. For instance, if a person is charged for an offence bordering on stealing or fraud to a tune of say, 4 billion naira, the penalty can be reduced to something lesser. The court might say, fine, instead of going to prison, carry out a community service or go for probation.Are there any exceptions to plea bargaining'The exception is to go for full trial.I mean are there cases where plea bargain cannot be considered'Well, it depends on the defendant. He is at liberty to offer a plea bargain to the prosecution, and if he accepts it, theyll negotiate, and take it to the court. The law does not specify any cases where plea bargain cannot be applicable; so for now, we take it that it is applicable to all offences. The ACJA is a new act, and weve not had any judicial pronouncements, so it will be left for the court to decide which cases plea bargain cannot be applied, it is not in the law for now.
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