A
former Attorney-General of the Federation has explained how he came
under pressure from unnamed persons to charge Muhammadu Buhari for
forgery in the run up to the 2015 presidential election.
Jonathan & Buhari
While speaking in an exclusive interview with The Cable, Nigeria's
former Attorney-General of the Federation, Bello Adoke, revealed how he
allegedly came under pressure from unnamed persons to charge then
presidential candidate, Muhammadu Buhari for forgery in the run up to
the 2015 election.
He also said that he pushed back against demands for former
President Goodluck Jonathan to constitute an interim national government
in the run up to the 2015 elections, adding that he promptly “dismissed the suggestion” in deference to the constitution and after weighing the consequences of such move at the time.
“It is true that some people came to me and said Buhari should
be disqualified because of certificate forgery. As a man with fidelity
to the Constitution, I dismissed the suggestion quickly,” the former attorney general said.
Recall that President Buhari’s certificate was a topic of
nationwide controversy in the run up to the 2015 elections, with the
then ruling Peoples Democratic Party (PDP) suggesting that he didn’t
have a valid school certificate to contest in the poll.
Although Government College, formerly Provincial Secondary School,
Katsina, which the president graduated from in 1961, confirmed that he
undertook the University of Cambridge West African School Certificate
Examination, his political adversaries still hold that he didn’t finish
from school.
The Nigerian Army, in which Buhari retired as a major-general, also
published his school records, but said it couldn’t vouch for their
authenticity. The Army was accused of politicising the situation at the
time.
Adoke in the interview disclosed that he was amongst officials of
the Jonathan administration that declined to pay politics with the
country’s legal system and internal security.
“In fact, there were cases in court which I felt were not
necessary. They were already becoming a security threat. As a
responsible attorney-general, I believed we did not need further crisis
in the country.
“Boko Haram was enough problem for us. I resisted pressures to
compound the security challenges in the country by filing or authorising
such cases to be filed on behalf of the government.
“I was not doing President Muhammadu Buhari any favour, I must
say that. I was being faithful to the laws of the land. That was the
duty expected of me. If you call that sympathy, so be it. But I didn’t
do him a favour,” Adoke said.
He said he didn’t yield to pressure not because he didn’t have the
power to file charges against Buhari, but because he could not see a
tenable case of forgery against the president at the time.
“There was pressure to issue a fiat to charge him to court for
forgery. But I made my position very clear that I could not see any
forgery at all. The law did not require you to submit any certificate to
INEC and Buhari did not submit any certificate.
“The law only said you must have a minimum qualification of so
so and so. Therefore, where was the forgery? If he didn’t submit a
certificate, where was forgery? There is no police report, no
investigation. No responsible attorney-general will issue any such fiat
based on the record before me.
“But I could have been reckless if I wanted to be reckless. I
could have been irresponsible if I wanted to be irresponsible. I could
have issued the fiat,” Adoke said, adding that he recognised what could have been the consequences.
“There could have been mayhem. There could have been destruction. That could have led to the postponement of the elections.
“I know what attorneys-general have done in the past, not
minding the consequences for the polity. I know what they are capable of
doing. But I am a constitutional purist.
“When they mooted the idea of an interim government, I was the
one that came out to say the concept of interim government is unknown to
law.
“People told President Jonathan that I was disloyal, that I was working for Buhari,” he stated.
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