The problems in the Abia Judiciary for the past three or so years are, no doubt, having serious consequences on the administration of justice in Abia State. It is unlikely that the State, itself a nascent one, faced with the urgent challenges of development, including developing a credible and accessible justice system for its people, can afford the digression or dissipation of energy and synergy potentially available for development. Moreover, the prolonged crisis puts the justice institution in bad light; sordid facts and revelations, resentment and conflict, controversy and tension, probes and corruption have come to define Abia's prickly justice landscape and engendered a near impossible climate to execute any meaningful or constructive policy for improving justice delivery in the state, which must be the cardinal duty of every justice administrator in this time.

Why did Abia escalate to this state? First, is the Chief Judge's management of the situation. Undoubtedly, Chief Judge Amah wanted to get back at the CRAN executives, for actions that culminated in his reprimand by the NJC and hardly disguised the intention. While it is understandable for Chief Judge Amah to feel hurt and indignant by CRAN's actions, it is remarkably a failure of leadership to translate that anger to vengeance, and worse still, to seek the gratification of that vengeance through the illicit use of channels reserved for the due administration of justice. Since Hon. Justice Amah survived the NJC inquiry, and since his personal code and honour permitted him to carry on as Chief Judge, he shouldn't have followed a course of recrimination; on the contrary, he should have striven to minimize further damage to the State's highest judicial office. By taking the line of revenge, he fueled and spread rising tensions within his own domain.

Next is the National Judicial Council, the NJC; whilestill seized of the petition filed by CRAN (Abia State Chapter) against the Hon. Chief Judge Amah, the NJC reportedly appointed Chief Judge Amah into a Committee to probe another petition against a Judge in Delta? State. In this latter committee was the man heading the NJC's probe against Chief Judge Amah, Hon. Justice Kolawole, rtd. Justice of the Court of Appeal. That singular act had, and has had the unfortunate effect of generating questions of the NJC's concern for the transparency and impartiality of the process of the Chief Judge's probe. When the NJC returned a verdict, only partially sustaining the allegations against the Chief Judge, and reprimanding him with a “go and sin no more” type of sanction, it was perceived by some members of the public as evidence of bias.

There are no convincing reasons to believe that the Hon. Justice Kolawole's Panel did not discharge its duties conscientiously, without fear or favour. There are equally no valid policy reasons we can find, why the Panel or the NJC cannot recommend to use a relatively lighter sanction than is otherwise available. The powers of the NJC to discipline should, we are persuaded, include, as a matter of policy, the power to select appropriate measures to fit the circumstances of any particular case, and meet the overall objective of maintaining the institutional integrity of the judicial branch. However, the involvement of Chief Judge Amah and Hon. Justice Kolawole in another probe concurrently as the inquiry into CRAN's petition was ongoing flawed the work of the Panel; it was a faux pas, and could make, altogether, an unfavourable impression.

One of its effects was CRAN's reluctance to file further reports against Hon. Justice Amah to the NJC, preferring, instead, to go to the House of Assembly. And there, even more appalling things were said of justice functionaries and justice administration. It has been said that the NJC was unhappy that CRAN went beyond it, to the Assembly

It certainly would have been auspicious for CRAN, if it had fresh accusations, to use the NJC mechanism, and re-provided that august body the chance to deal with any fresh alerts of delinquency, but in the circumstances in which CRAN acted, we think they were entitled to their fears, and their election, not because we think the NJC would not have done a good job - far from that. We believe that the NJC would have discharged its responsibilities fairly, and squarely. But because, by some inexplicable misstep, the Council blundered when it mattered.

Although not a significant factor in the overall scheme of things, we could also, with a lot of hesitation, pass on what ought to have been a well-intentioned act by the Chief Justice of Nigeria. It was reported that while the petition against Justice Amah was pending, the CJN commissioned a court hall named after him in Abia State, sometime in March 2002. And a few people have made, (perhaps far-fetched) inferences from that activity. We have no reason to suspect that declaring a court hall open, a ceremonial which, perhaps, had been scheduled long before the petition to the NJC was conceived, would in any way affect the NJC's determination of the outcome of Chief Judge K.O. Amah's probe. But the reality is that there is a perception that it did.

We do not wish to overbear on the point, or to pull the name of the CJN into this: however, we must say, when persons who are particularly vulnerable as the CRAN activists were are involved, extra care must be taken: the sensitivities of persons who are parties to a “confrontation” will be different from those who are not. As fear easily feeds on imagination, what will register as an impression for a party to a dispute will not necessarily be of significance to others.

However, it is not too late to rectify past errors. The NJC must act now to salvage Abia's justice system from its deepwater plunge, reclaim authority to make justice functionaries accountable, and re-string perceptions of its own transparency. It must find an end, a satisfactory end to the Abia State judicial crisis. There are options available to the Council which we cannot fully enumerate here. Access to Justice has already, in a letter to the Council outlined a few. Another possibility may be todeal with the situation in Abia in stages. In the first stage, the Council can call all the parties to a roundtable dialogue to explore feasible lines of accommodation for each other, and invite persons and bodies like the State's Attorney General, the Abia Bar Association, and representatives of CRAN's parent body to the meeting. If a temporary respite is secured, latter stages should then seek to address, in a comprehensive form, the institutional issues raised by all the parties.

It is hard to insist that Abia will resolve itself, by itself, obviating the need for external diplomacy: it couldn't. Even if the “trouble makers” - the CRAN activists - were permanently neutralized, we will still face the cold, inhibiting reality that the man on the ground has lost, in the eyes of many involved in the justice enterprise, the respect, dignity and moral authority of leadership, and will probably not function in a way that befits the leadership of a vital arm of government whose authority is rooted in respect. And that respect is nearly all the judiciary has.

His fellow judges, whose loyalty and respect he must command, will hardly see him as a model of exemplary leadership; the lawyers whom he will need to talk and cooperate with, will barely find him sufferable and there is little reason to expect that the legislative and executive branches of government retains a high level of regard for the judiciary under its current leadership, given some of the reports that have passed around quite a bit concerning him. But the truth is that the activists, considering the guts they have shown so far, will unlikely be silenced by the sleight of a controversial High Court verdict. They will likely fight harder and it is not unlikely we will see greater eagerness for a politically determined solution.

Lastly, If we do not deal with the situation in Abia State in a way that unequivocally shows that it does not represent the paradigm of our fight against corruption in the justice arena, many within and without our shores will perhaps mould their opinions of our judicial system by reference to the unresolved crisis of leadership and integrity in Abia State. And that will do no credit to our NJC's (and indeed our collective struggle) to rebuild faith and integrity in our justice system.