Speaker says Oloyede betrayed judicial conduct

The Osun State House of Assembly has, on the recommendations of a seven-man committee headed by Mr. Akintunde Adegboye, dismissed the petition filed by Justice Folahanmi Oloyede against Governor Rauf Aregbesola.

It also recommended the petitioner for sanction through the state Judicial Service Commission.

The House, in a motion of 25 against one, as moved by its Majority Leader, Mr. Timothy Owoeye, and seconded by Mr. Abdulahi Ibrahim, representing Iwo State Constituency, adopted the committee’s recommendations.

Among the adopted recommendations, the embattled judge was found wanting of abandoning the petition for non-appearance, lack of evidence as well as premising her petition on rumours and hearsay.

The Assembly’s Speaker, Najeem Salaam, at the plenary, said the embattled Justice Oloyede had betrayed the oath of her office.

He added that the judge lost her worth to be a judge in the temple of justice.

The Speaker said the violation of processes and procedure as spelt out by the constitution and judicial code of conduct, through the judge’s partisan and emotional disposition on the allegations raised “against the government she is serving, has shown her as unfit for the bench”.

Salaam, while explaining why he allowed the petition to sail through, noted that the state parliament under his watch elected to look into the petition not to gag Oloyede’s freedom of expression in accordance with sections 128 and 129 of the Constitution, which empowered the legislature to investigate any public petition forwarded to the House.

The Speaker noted that the issue of impeachment raised in the petition was a mere opinion of the petitioner, not the position of the law.

He noted that the parliament was conscious of the letter and the spirit of Section 188 raised by some lawyers, but added that a petition raised by the judicial officer could not have been substituted for the position of the one-third of the Assembly members capable of intimating impeachment article.

He said: “We appreciate the views of the two legal luminaries who ventilated their opinions on the conduct of Justice Oloyede and the move of the parliament to tolerate the petition at all.

“But having found no precedence for the action of the judge, the Parliament under me chose to set up the committee to investigate the content of the petition.

“But we are surprised that the judge lost the courage to come forward to defend the allegations leveled against the duo of the governor and his deputy; suggesting that she is not worth her onion. It shows that if an individual sues the government to her court, the ruling could be preempt.”

The Speaker said he would soon hold talk with the board of the state’s Civil Service Commission, the Chams consultancy in charge of workers’ documents, Head of Service and labour leaders on the issue of ghost workers and regime of wage payment with a view to debriefing them.

He said the parliament would be guided on its intervention on the issue of delayed salaries, government/workers’ dispute and the sustainability of the wage regime and other related issues.

Salaam hailed labour leaders for coming to the negotiation table, adding that the culture of negotiating on strike at every occasion should be reviewed for collective good.