So
you wouldn’t believe Maybe a round of defeat, Defeat your belief...
Let
it play on your mind that it might be the last time my heart would beat for
both sides satisfaction. Putting the reason for this write-up in perspective, I
need to state that the term justice is relative as it means different things to
different persons at a particular time or place. Amidst this uncertainty it
must be stated that justice is the satisfaction derived from putting a trust in
a set up mechanism especially in terms of dispute settlement. To a man walking
on the street, vindicating a side and condemning the other is justice, to a
legal luminary making sure that the object of law is achieved, is justice.
The
common saying that let justice be done if heaven falls gives me the need to say
that it is a must that litigants who had embarked on a voyage of search for an
end to their unending grieves must go home smiling and raising thumbs up for
the system I mean the court. Make no noise raise no eyebrow on your own, it is
not enough to get mad and rage with anger that leads to unending destruction,
the rooms are opened and they say it is the last hope of common man.
Never
betray the little trust on ground, people are looking for truth we can’t fail
them now. What do we do? Justice delayed they say is justice denied. There should
be speedy dispensation of matters before courts and similar bodies and panels.
A man should not wait forever for blame to be apportioned, if justice is not
all about that, litigants in court should not wait forever either.
The
impression the four walls of that room gives a man on the street is the picture
of a monster looking from under the glasses who from all indications had wined
and dined with corruption and various ‘Nigerian factors’. This impression is
not always right though with an element of sanity in the assertion. A less
formalistic and rigid system of dispensing justice will boost the trust level
of the people in the system, we are going to this extent and or more to ensure
that justice is done. We are desperate for it though we are not violent, and we
won’t be.
From
the legal perspective, the idea of justice is hinged on the twin principle of
nemojudex incausa(don’t be a judge in your own cause) and audi aliterem partem (hear
both sides of the story) these two principles had been identified as the
cardinal pillars of justice, it has been consistently advocated that whenever
the need arises people should be given fair and equal playing ground. Honestly
they are not cosmetics, rather they are meant to be followed and adhered to
strictly. The extent we are willing to go. The issue of fair hearing is as old
as the world itself. It is not desperation that led God into hearing out Cain
before condemning him for the murder of his brother; it was only prompted by
justice.
Outside
the court, justice is when lines begin to fall in decent places for Nigerians
in terms of economic improvement and security and other dividends of democracy.
Punishment of corrupt public officers. This will definitely take us back to the
court. Hearing and saying that the voice of the masses counts is justice, this
in fact is the crux of the matter, we can only begin to count our blessings if
what is being done inside and outside the court begin to have tremendous impact
on the lives of Nigerians.
Amidst
all these it is one to say that justice is being done, it is another to see it
being done. The insignificant movement of the wheel of justice is frustrating
and tiresome. There is need to state emphatically that fiat jautistic ruat
adcoeluni i.e let justice be done even if heaven falls. And so the rain
continues under the reign of oppression. Justice won’t reign, he says...