Nigeria’s Flood of Forgeries, by Ike Willie-Nwobu

To live and work and be a citizen of Nigeria is to risk fraud — either being defrauded or defrauding others. In many ways, it is a risk to be Nigerian, a risk without very high chances of reward.

When a system lacks credibility, cracks appear. Many fall through the cracks. When people want to beat such a system, they pull papers to cover the cracks. To cover their tracks, they pull more than just paper though, they also push paperwork.
The National Judicial Council is the body empowered by the constitution to appoint, supervise and discipline judicial officers in Nigeria. This council, a creation of the constitution, wields enormous powers over those who administer justice.
When the council sat on, it combed through its catalog of caustic petitions in a country that has lost confidence in its judiciary, and found that Theresa Chikeka, the Chief Judge of Imo State and Babagana Mahdi, the Grand Kadi of Yobe State, had tampered with their records and falsified their age in order to remain in office past their due retirement dates, and retain power over litigants, and lawyers. The Council duly recommended their retirement.

There is something about judicial corruption that touches the rawest of nerves. How can it be that a vicious vice such as forgery which at full flow seeks to appropriate that which belongs to another is found on the bench among men tasked with rooting forgery out of the system? Yet, the NJC has chosen to slap the judicial officers involved on the wrist and send them into retirement instead of dismissing them.

Again, where two have been found, including at the head of a state judiciary and the zenith of a religious court in a state, there should be more. It cannot be that in the judiciary which has continued to draw alarming glances from Nigerians, only those two have tampered with their records to perpetuate themselves in office beyond their retirement dates. This alarming scandal invites the NJC to do more probing, more urgent soul-searching. What really is in the documents paraded by those who administer justice in the country? What is in their books? In a country which already suffers from an integrity deficit can do without more questionable credentials among those who administer justice in the name of the constitution.
In a country awash with abundant opportunities for forgery and falsification, it is no surprise that the younger generation is fast catching up with the devious subterfuge of those who would even forge birth certificates to claim citizenship of other countries if only they could.

For the younger generation, learning in the vice that forgery is has been lightning fast. In 2023, Mmesoma Ejikeme, a nineteen-year-old student from Anambra State went viral for supposedly scoring highest in the Unified Tertiary Matriculated Examination conducted by the Joint Admission and Matriculation Board(JAMB). While a country easily carried feted her and firmed up all sorts of gifts and scholarship offers to her, JAMB combed through its records before hotly contesting her claims to excellence as Nigeria’s highest-scoring university-eligible teenager. A furious exchange of verbal and epistolary volleys between the body on one hand, and Mmesoma ensued, with many Nigerians vilifying the examinations body which was, however, vindicated when Mmesoma owned up to her forgery. It was striking that despite her public admission of mendacity, many Nigerians were reluctant to sufficiently condemn was she did, preferring instead to describe her as smart and savvy in a country where the crooked are going farther than the straight.
In a certificate-crazy country where many people have become craftsmen of curious certificates with the collusion of those who should be gatekeepers of genuine records, the danger and demise of authenticity stares square in the face.

It is no coincidence that in today’s Nigeria, while many older individuals have lost the moral authority that personal integrity over the passage of time confers, many younger individuals are embracing the vices that denude society of the values it holds dear.

Nigeria’s moral morass has a poignant and pregnant provenance. Aborting or bringing the baby to birth will be far more difficult than ever imagined.

Ike Willie-Nwobu
Ikewilly9@gmail.com