The Court of Appeal has announced that it will hear the suit filed by Justice Walter Onnoghen, the former Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), on Tuesday. Onnoghen is challenging the Code of Conduct Tribunal CCT, order that removed him from office in 2019; the suit was filed in 2019 at the appellate court.
In his suit, the former CJN is asking the court to set aside the judgement passed by the CCT against him on the grounds of lack of jurisdiction and other grounds. The judgement was passed on April 18, 2019.
The counsel to the CJN is Adegboyega Awomolo, SAN. He has his appeal marked CA/ABJ/375 & 376 & 377/2019; his argument stands the court does not have the jurisdiction to hear and pass the judgement; he also does not believe there was a case of bias and absence of fair hearing.
The sole respondent in the case is the Federal Government of Nigeria, and Justice Onnoghen is the appellant.
Journalists sighted a notice of the hearing on Monday. The notice was titled CA/ABJ/375 & 376 & 377/2019. By the way, Justice Onnoghen and FRN.
In the judgement passed by the code of conduct tribunal in 2019, the court convicted the former CJN of all six counts of charges brought before him. The charges include a breach of the Code of Conduct for Public Officers brought against him by the federal government while serving as the CJN.
The chairman of the court Danladi Umar, in his judgement had ordered the immediate removal of the former CJN from office.
The tribunal went further to strip him of all the offices he had held in the past years. Among the offices included the Chairmanship of the National Judicial Council, NJC, and the Chairmanship of the Federal Judicial Service Commission.
The judgement further noted that the former CJN forfeits his five bank accounts and the money in the accounts, which he failed to declare in his asset declaration form, submitted to the Code of Conduct Bureau, the government agency responsible for managing the assets of public officeholders in the country.
The former CJN had served under President Buhari for 85 days; his tenure ended on the 4th of April when he submitted his letter of resignation to the president after the CCT suspended him,
His days as the CJN were marked by a year of ordeal. His bad days started with the Anti-Corruption and Research-Based Data Initiative and its Executive Director, Mr Dennis Aghanya after he petitioned the Code of Conduct Bureau on January 9, 2019.
The petitioner had accused the CJN of violating the Code of Conduct for Public Officers, which was related to the declaration of assets.
The CCT commenced an intensive investigation into the allegation. In January, the CCB filed multiple charges against the CJN before the Code of Conduct Tribunal.
The CJN, who acted on the order of the Code of Conduct Tribunal, suspended the CJN on January 25th. The CCT had ordered his removal from his office, and after his suspension, the next most senior person, Justice Tanko Muhammad, was sworn in as the next CJN.
