| The Gombe State Government has dismissed the allegations by two lawyers accusing it of undue pressure on the judiciary. The state government described the allegation as unbecoming of any lawyer worth his\her name.
It said the contents of the texts of a press conferences addressed by Barristers Henry Nwoye and Luka Haruna few days ago were laughable and malicious and should be regarded as such. It said as a law-abiding arm of government, there was no way it could dabble into any matter before the court.
The state’s Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice, Barr Zubair Muhammad Umar, in a statement yesterday on behalf of the state government, said: “The press conferences by the two lawyers amount to empty hot air.” He noted that Nwoye referred to an order by the Federal High Court to maintain status quo in the case of Senator Mohammed Danjuma Goje and others vs Gombe State Government and others, but that the lawyer “did not allege that the state government is in breach of that order. He did not attribute anything against the government.”
On the second case before the Chief Magistrate Court, the Attorney-General said, Barr Luka “did not say what the government did that was wrong.” He explained that when the lawyer applied for the bail of his client, the state government objected and the court denied bail in the first instance.
“Very unprofessionally, the same counsel applied for bail again before the same court over the same case and that this time, the magistrate granted the bail in questionable circumstances even after his attention was drawn to the illegality of the action. “Incidentally, none of the lawyers accused the Gombe State Government of doing anything wrong. They were just after 15 minutes of fame,” Umar added.
He said the two lawyers’ media outburst was part of the campaign of calumny against the Acting Chief Judge of the state. “By casting aspersions against the Acting Chief Judge, we know it was a continuation of the campaign of calumny against the jurist,” he said. He urged the good people of Gombe State and other Nigerians to disregard such comments as the Gombe State Government would continue to obey the courts in whatever circumstance. | |
