Former President of the Court of Appeal, Zainab Bulkachuwa, has broken her silence on her husband’s recent confession of compromising her decisions to the advantage of his senator colleagues while she was in office.

Adamu Bulkachuwa, as senator representing Bauchi North, had spoken during the 10 June valedictory session of the outgone 9th Senate, boasting about infringing on his wife’s “freedom and independence” while she served as president of the appellate court.

He bragged that he aided his colleagues in the Senate to obtain favour from his wife, who was superintending over the Court of Appeal that served as the final arbiter on appeals concerning electoral disputes in parliamentary elections in Nigeria.

Adamu Bulkachuwa

“My wife, whose freedom and independence I encroached upon while (she) was in office, and she has been very tolerant and accepted my encroachment and extended her help to my colleagues,” said Mr Bulkachuwa, 83, during the senate’s proceedings.

Mr Bulkachuwa, in a bid to downplay the backlash of his damning confession, would later say his comment was taken out of context because the then Senate President, Ahmad Lawan, did not allow him to complete his thoughts.

He said had if he had the opportunity to express himself as he wished, he would have shown there was nothing unethical about the help he obtained from his wife.

The former President of the Court of Appeal, with a judicial career spanning four decades, said justices under her leadership could bear her witness that she never interfered with their independence.

Mrs Bulkachuwa, the hardest hit by her husband’s comments, which also rubbed off badly on the crisis-ridden integrity of the Nigerian judiciary, denied any wrongdoing.

In a three-paragraph statement dated 17 June but released early Monday, Mrs Bulkachuwa said she never at any time compromised her oath of office, contrary to her husband’s comments suggesting that she acted unethically on many occasions.

The former President of the Court of Appeal with a judicial career spanning four decades, said justices under her leadership could bear her witness that she never interfered with their independence.

“My attention has been drawn to the trending video of what was said by my husband, Senator Adamu M. Bulkachuwa. I want to state categorically that I never at any time compromised my oath of office to favour any party who appeared before me throughout my judicial career spanning 40 years of service to my country.

“My decisions were always based on the facts, the law and in accordance with my conscience and oath of office.

“Also, as President of the Court of Appeal, my fellow justices of the court can attest to the fact that I never interfered with the independence of any of the justices of the court in the discharge of their judicial functions,” she stated in the statement she signed personally.

Controversies

This is another time Mrs Bulkachuwa has found herself in a difficult situation of denying allegations of unethical practices relating to her time as the President of the Appeal Court, a position she held between April 2014 to March 2020.

In the waning days of her headship of the appellate court in February 2020, she shared her four-decade experience with journalists in Lagos, where she denied an allegation that she took a N6 billion bribe.

“There was a time when allegations were flying around that I was given N6 billion, and I laughed. So, if I was given N6 billion, do you think I would still be here?” She wondered.

She also talked about how she maintained her independence as a judicial officer and guarded against political influence despite being married to a politician.

“My husband is a politician, but politics is a no-go area in the house. Even my children are aware of that. No politician is invited to the house. My husband can pursue whatever he wants to pursue as a politician, but we hardly discuss politics in the house. All these help to guard against any influence from any politician,” Mrs Bulkachuwa had averred during a presser in Lagos in February 2020.

But her husband’s claim, coming later, sharply contradicts hers, calling the image she painted of herself in 2020 into question.

Many have said Mr Bulkachuwa’s claim, retrospectively, serves as a validation of the suspicion of bias the opposition Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) had against Mrs Bulkachuwa after she appointed herself to head the five-member panel of the Presidential Election Petition Court in 2019.

The PDP, along with its then-presidential candidate, Atiku Abubakar, was challenging the election of then-President Muhammadu Buhari of the ruling All Progressives Congress (APC).
The party alleged that Mrs Bulkachuwa would not adjudicate on the case impartially due to her tie to her husband, who was, at the time, a senator-elect on the platform of the APC, and her son, Aliyu Abubakar, who was a governorship aspirant on the platform of the party.

She would later step down from the panel and replace herself with Mohammed Garba, who chaired the panel and eventually saw the proceedings through to the end.

Mrs Bulkachuwa retired from the bench as president of the Court of Appeal after clocking the mandatory retirement age of 70 for judicial officers in 2020.

Blight on judiciary
Her husband’s comments have further eroded confidence in the crisis-ridden integrity of the Nigerian judiciary.

A former president of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Olisa Agbakoba, while condemning the remark, said it, however, seemed to have suggested why his client, Usman Tuggar, lost to Mr Bulkachuwa in three courts while challenging the outcome of the disputed Bauchi North senatorial election.

Mr Bulkachuwa’s comments have drawn condemnations, with Mr Agbakoba describing it as “a monumental disgrace for our institutions.”

The NBA president, Yaukubu Maikyau, who called it a direct affront to the judiciary’s integrity, has called for the arrest and prosecution of Mr Bulkachuwa for his confession to perverting the course of administration of justice.

But the National Judicial Council (NJC), a statutory body concerned with appointing and disciplining judges, as well as policy matters of the judiciary, has kept mum on the issue.
NJC’s silence on the issue, it was learnt, is on the grounds that it has no power over Mrs Bulkachuwa, a retired judicial officer