On September 26, 1979, weeks after the presidential election
that saw the emergence of Shehu Shagari of the National Party of Nigeria (NPN)
as president, Richard Akinjide stood before a panel of seven supreme court
justices and convinced them that two-thirds of 19 states was ”12 two-thirds”,
and not 13. As the counsel to Shagari whose victory was being challenged by
Obafemi Awolowo of the Unity Party of Nigeria (UPN), Akinjide’s arithmetic put
a seal to the former president’s victory.
After Shagari was declared president-elect in 16 August
1979, Awolowo went to court to contest that the NPN candidate did not meet the
requirements stipulated by the electoral decree of 1977 that governed the
presidential election of 1979. The provision stipulates that in order to be
elected to office, a presidential candidate must have scored at least one
quarter of the total votes cast in at least two-thirds of the states in
Nigeria, and the highest number of the votes cast. Nigeria had 19 states at the
time.
In the election which was held on August 11,1979, Shagari
polled the highest number of votes cast with a score of 5,688,657, followed by
Awolowo who scored 4,916,651. But there was a problem. He failed to score at
least a quarter of the votes cast in 13 states which was mathematically the
two-thirds of the 19 states, missing out only in Kano where he got 19.94 percent
of the votes cast.
To the amusement of many, Shagari was declared winner by the
Federal Electoral Commission (FEDECO), leading to a legal tussle between him
and Awolowo who employed the services of great minds such as Ayodele Awojobi,
professor of mechanical engineering at the University of Lagos; Chike Obi,
professor of mathematics at the University of Ibadan, and Godwin Ajayi of the
department of history at the University of Ibadan.
AKINJIDE’S MATHEMATICS TO THE RESCUE
Awolowo was almost certain the election tribunal was going
to declare him winner considering the letters of the decree but that was never
going to happen. In its ruling on September 6,1979, the tribunal upheld the
argument of Akinjide, who by then was already a senior advocate of Nigeria
(SAN), and threw out the submission of Awolowo.
Devastated but still determined, the UPN candidate proceeded
to appeal against the ruling at the supreme court where Akinjide rescued
Shegari a second time. There, he again argued the two-thirds of 19 to be 12
two-thirds and not 13. This account of what transpired quoted him as arguing
that “in order to get one-quarter of the total votes cast in the thirteenth
state, the reckoning must not be the total votes but two-thirds of the total
votes; meaning that once a candidate satisfied the requirement of obtaining
one-quarter of the total votes cast in twelve states and in two-thirds of the
thirteenth state, then he should be accepted as having satisfied the
requirement of scoring at least one-quarter of the total votes cast in each of
at least two-thirds of the nineteen states of the federation.”
However, mindful of the inherent lapses in the judgement,
the supreme court — wait for it — added a caveat to its judgement, that the
verdict must never be cited as a precedent in future cases. That judgement
later earned Akinjide ‘the mathematician’ title, having succeeded against the
likes of Chike Obi.
APPOINTED MINISTER BY SHAGARI
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| At the Constitutional Conference in 2014 |
After that tremendous show at the courts, Akinjide was
appointed minister of justice and attorney-general of the federation by Shagari
in December 1979, serving in that role until October 1983. It was during his
time in office that Nigeria temporarily reversed executions of armed robbers
and abolished the decree barring exiles from returning to the country.
What is interesting, however, was that his new boss at the
time had served together with him during the administration of Prime Minister
Tafawa Balewa in the first republic; Shagari was the minister of works while
Akinjide was minister of education.
In his speech at the public presentation of the book,
‘Fellow Country Men – the story of Coup D’etats in Nigeria’ by Richard
Akinnola, Akinjide recalled how Shagari stripped his ministers of the privilege
of having access to monthly intelligence reports.
He had said: “When I was in Tafawa Balewa’s cabinet, all
Cabinet Ministers had access to written intelligence reports every month. That
was the practice at that time. But when Shagari came in, for reasons which I
cannot explain, that practice was no longer followed.
“But by virtue of my duties as the Attorney-General and as a
member of the National Security Council, I continued to have access to some
sensitive matters.”
HE BELIEVED THE AMALGAMATION OF NIGERIA WAS NOTHING BUT
‘COMPLETE FRAUD’
In that speech, the late senior lawyer argued that the
decision of the British colonial masters to amalgamate the northern and
southern protectorates in Nigeria was one of the “root causes” of the nation’s
problems.
He also believed the whole process was fraudulent.
Akinjide had said: “When the amalgamation took effect, the
British government sealed off the South from the North. And between 1914 and
1960, that’s a period of 46 years, the British allowed minimum contact between
the North and South because it was not in the British interest that the North
be allowed to be polluted by the educated South. That was the basis on which we
got our independence in 1960 when I was in the parliament. I entered parliament
on December 12, 1959.
“When the North formed a political party, the Northern
leaders called it the Northern People’s Congress (NPC). They didn’t call it
Nigeria’s people Congress. That was in accordance with the dictum and policies
of Lugard. When Aminu Kano formed his own party, it was called Northern
Elements Progressive Union (NEPU) not Nigerian Elements Progressive Union. It
was only Awolowo and Zik who were mistaken that there was anything called
Nigeria.
“In fact, the so-called Nigeria created in 1914 was a
complete fraud. It was created not in the interest of Nigeria or Nigerians but
in the interest of the British. And what were the structures created? The
structures created were as follows: Northern Nigeria was to represent England;
Western Nigeria like Wales; Eastern Nigeria was to be like Scotland.”
MOVED FOR ADOPTION OF 2014 CONFERENCE REPORT
The late Akinjide was no doubt one of Nigeria’s brightest
minds in legal profession having practised since the 1950s when he returned
from England where he was first called to the bar after his higher education.
He also involved in various key conferences in the nation’s
history, including the 2005 national political reform conference (NPRC) and the
2014 national conference where he moved the motion for the adoption of the
final conference report being the oldest delegate at the age of 82.
The former minister was also actively involved in the
drafting of the 1979 constitution, having worked in the judicial system
sub-committee of the constitutional drafting committee of 1975-977.
‘HOW I GOT THE SUPREME COURT TO RECOGNISE SHAGARI AS
PRESIDENT’
In a 2011 interview, Akinjide later spoke of what transpired
in 1979 during the legal tussle between Shagari, his client, and Awolowo. He
also dismissed the court’s caveat that the judgement is to never be used as a
reference point.
Hear him: “My defence against Chief Awolowo’s petition was
predicated on three critical points. One, that there was total compliance in
accordance with the electoral law. In the alternative, there was substantial
compliance. Thirdly, in any event, the electoral petition and the reliefs sought
were flawed and Justice Otutu Obaseki highlighted that very thoroughly.
“So, from the point of view of total compliance or
substantial compliance or the way the petition was presented, we won. Professor
Reid, of the University of London wrote me and also told me that what I did has
made a notable contribution to constitutional law all over the world.
“There is no doubt, and that case of Awolowo Vs Shagari has
been cited in many electoral petition cases in the country because I hear of
some rubbish in some places that the judgement should not be cited. That is absolute rubbish.”
‘HOW NIGERIA WAS DESTROYED’
Akinjide was one of those who believed the 1966 military
coup dealt heavily with Nigeria and was possibly what swerved the course of the
nation to the wrong direction.
In a THISDAY interview, he said Nigeria’s destruction
started with the coup, largely blaming the politicians at the time for what
transpired.
According to him, “I think politicians of the first republic
share in the blame of the destruction of Nigeria by allowing the military coup,
because military intervention in politics is an abnormal thing. But it happened
at a time when Nigeria just started as an independent nation.
“At that critical time the leader of the opposition was in
prison for treason. The south-west was in crisis, that was the period of an
operation …. would you agree that politicians of the first republic didn’t
manage the situation well and allowed the military to intervene in politics?
Secondly, when the Prime Minister was missing for a couple
of days, the politicians at that time or those who were in charge couldn’t
seize the opportunity and present leadership because the nation was in a state
of anarchy for two days. We didn’t have a head of government and eventually
allowed the military to seize power.
“By then, Dr. Nnamdi Azikwe, the president, was outside the
country and the acting president, Orizu Nwafor, announced that the politicians
had handed over power to the military.”
He added that Nigeria, then 57 years old, still had nothing
to celebrate and that while the “only thing that is certain (about the
country’s fate) is uncertainty”, he would be happy to see the country celebrate
for good reasons and not just for the sake of independence.
Unfortunately, his wait for that celebration to happen was
brought to an abrupt end on Tuesday when he was snatched by the cold hands of
death at the age of 88 after battling an unknown illness. No doubt he would be
greatly missed.
Adieu, Pa Akinjide.
culled: TheCable
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