Senior Advocate of Nigeria and human rights activist, Ebun-Olu Adegboruwa has described President Muhammadu Buhari’s speech on naira swap as a contempt of court.
ThisNigeria reported that the Supreme Court had ordered that the old N200, N500 and N1000 notes were legal tenders until February 22, 2023, as opposed to the Central Bank of Nigeria’s February 10th deadline.
However, President Buhari, during a speech on Thursday, announced that he had directed the CBN to allow the use of old N200 notes until April 10, 2022.
Reacting to the speech, Adegboruwa said that President Buhari cannot overrule the Supreme Court as “there is separation of power in politics.”
According to him, the president “cannot choose which part of the Supreme Court order to obey, adding that the disregard to the court order is an executive rascality and a contempt of the Supreme Court”
The statement reads “The President cannot overrule the Supreme Court of Nigeria. There is separation of powers in a democracy.
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“Under section 235 of the 1999 Constitution, the Supreme Court is the final authority in legal pronouncements in Nigeria.
“Under section 287(1) of the Constitution, the President is statutorily obliged to obey, enforce and give effect to the decision of the Supreme Court.
“Section 287(1) of the 1999 Constitution:
“(1) The decisions of the Supreme court shall be enforced in any part of the Federation by all authorities and persons, and by courts with subordinate jurisdiction to that of the supreme Court.”
“The broadcast of the president is sad for our democracy. Since he already admitted that the matter is subjudice, the President should not have proceeded to vary the order of the Supreme Court.
“The president and indeed the executive should not give the impression that citizens can brazenly disregard lawful orders of any court, as that will only encourage anarchy and lawlessness.
“It amounts to executive rascality and brazen disregard and contempt of the Supreme Court, for the President to separate the denomination of the old notes for legality. It is not open to the President to choose which portion of the order of the Supreme Court that will be obeyed.
“The President should reverse his directive and add the N500 and N1000 old notes, failing which the Supreme Court should overrule the directive of the President in on February 22 when the case comes up.”
