A United States of America cable released by Wikileaks has revealed how former President Olusegun Obasanjo mounted pressure on the former Chief Justice of the Federation, Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais (rtd) and other Supreme Court Justices over the 2003 presidential petition brought by General Muhammudu Buhari (rtd.)
In the report, Wikileaks revealed how the former CJN had approached the then United States Ambassador to Nigeria, Mr. John Campbell to intimate him on Obasanjo’s interference with the judiciary.
According to the report “Nigeria’s former Chief Justice, Muhammadu Uwais, was so highly fearful of President Olusegun Obasanjo’s interference with the judiciary that in 2005, he sought a meeting with the new American ambassador, Mr. John Campbell, so that someone knows what is happening here in case something happened to him.”
The report explained further how Uwais had told Mr. Campbell that “he and other Supreme Court justices were experiencing “pressure and harassment” from President Obasanjo because the presidency was concerned that the court might not do his bidding beginning with complicated effort of James Ibori, the Delta State governor, to run for the governorship again in 2003 against the background of his alleged conviction for stealing roofing materials years earlier.”
According to the cable “at a point in the complicated process that involved all kinds of interests and political manoevres, Justice Uwais told Mr. Campbell that the Ibori case had been followed by attempts to deposit large sums of money into his bank account in order to implicate him.
As the legal challenge against President Obasanjo by the ANPP’s General Muhammadu Buhari over abuse of security forces, lapses in voting procedures and other elements of the severely flawed 2003 elections of Obasanjo’s election drew to a close in 2005 with the Supreme Court gearing up to announce its decision, pressure on the judiciary and other participants mounted.
It further stated that the former CJN “told Ambassador Campbell that attempts had been made to bribe, blackmail, intimidate and threaten him. Despite that, the Chief Justice stressed he would see the process through and that had never considered walking away from the challenge.”
Expressing his personal evaluation of the candidates, he characterized Buhari as “honest, hardworking and sincere,” and told the ambassador that Buhari would eliminate corruption.
(Wikileaks)