By Chibuike Nwabuko
ABUJA (PRECISE POST) – Senior lawyer and human rights advocate, Jibrin Okutepa, SAN, has warned that the quality of justice delivered in Nigeria will ultimately determine the country’s peace, stability, democratic development and leadership in the future.
Okutepa, in a statement posted on his X handle on Monday, said no nation could achieve meaningful development where justice was rationed, delayed or made difficult to access.
He argued that the conduct of those in positions of authority today would significantly influence the values and democratic practices of the leaders of tomorrow, stressing that young people were likely to replicate what they saw their leaders do.
According to him, those who witnessed leaders manipulate their way into power would be unlikely to embrace the right democratic ethos when they eventually assumed positions of leadership.
He said Nigeria had developed an unacceptable tendency to tolerate wrongdoing in practice while preaching righteousness in theory.
“As a people we seem to have developed the most unacceptable propensities to accept what is wrong in practice and preach what is right in theory,” he said, adding that even those who did wrong were often conscious that their actions were wrong. Okutepa described this contradiction as one of Nigeria’s greatest tragedies.
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He further lamented that people who stood for truth and integrity could become targets of hatred, while sycophancy and the willingness to flatter those in power were sometimes rewarded.
According to him, speaking truth to power, setting boundaries and refusing to compromise the truth could attract hostility, including from people who had previously benefited from one’s support.
“To be honest can earn you trouble. That is the tragedy of Nigeria and it is sad,” he said.
The senior lawyer also reflected on remarks by Rivers State Governor, Siminalayi Fubara, at the ongoing 66th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association in Port Harcourt.
Precise Post recalls that Governor Fubara had urged Nigerian judges to consider the wider societal implications of their judgments, stressing the importance of truth, courage, integrity and the rule of law in the administration of justice.
The governor, according to Okutepa, had stated that the quality of justice delivered today would shape the peace, stability and progress of Nigeria tomorrow.
Okutepa agreed with the governor but questioned whether Nigerians, including members of the legal profession, were genuinely prepared to practise the rule of law rather than a “rule of convenience.”
He argued that if Nigerians were truly committed to the rule of law, the country would have made far greater progress and lived up to its description as the “giant of Africa.”
With lawyers gathered in Port Harcourt for the NBA conference, Okutepa posed a fundamental question to the profession: whether lawyers, whom he described as “the physicians of justice,” had succeeded in healing themselves from the societal ailments undermining the legal profession.
His answer was emphatic: “We have not.”
He argued that lawyers could not effectively prescribe solutions to the problems of society if they remained affected by the same problems they were expected to cure.
According to him, the legal profession had sometimes overlooked issues that had weakened the foundation of justice in Nigeria, while eloquent speeches were used to conceal uncomfortable truths.
“We seem to cover truth with the garment of falsehoods in eloquent speeches,” he said, maintaining that such speeches became “empty hollow rituals” when measured against the realities on the ground.
Okutepa therefore challenged Nigerian lawyers and the leadership of the profession to move beyond rhetoric and confront the institutional and ethical problems threatening justice and the rule of law.
He maintained that the survival of Nigeria’s democracy and the quality of its future leadership would depend largely on whether truth, integrity, courage and justice were genuinely practised rather than merely celebrated in speeches.
