The Chief Justice of Nigeria, Olukayode Ariwoola, has reportedly nominated his daughter, Justice Victoria Oluwakemi, as a judge to the Federal Capital Territory High Court in Abuja.
According to Peoples Gazette, the nomination of Justice Oluwakemi by the CJN was revealed through an internal memo.
The news platform reports that the CJN began lobbying to seat his daughter on the bench after he was notified in a January 18, 2024, letter from the Chief Judge of the FCT High Court, Justice Husseini Baba-Yusuf, that 12 new positions had opened up in the court.
Baba-Yusuf reportedly urged Ariwoola, Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice (AGF), Lateef Fagbemi, and the President of Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), Yakubu Chonoko Maikyau, to send candidates drawn from a dozen states.
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Baba-Yusuf said: “In line with the National Judicial Council Guidelines and Procedural Rules for Appointment of Judicial Officers to Superior Courts, I hereby invite your lordships, the honourable attorney-general of the federation and minister of justice and the president of the Nigerian Bar Association to kindly nominate suitably qualified persons from the aforementioned states for appointment to the Federal Capital Territory High Court.”
A judiciary source told the news platform that: “The CJN personally asked the FCT CJ to do this exercise to employ his daughter-in-law before his retirement in August,” adding, “When is he going to realise that the Nigerian judiciary is not his personal asset?”
“The chief judge has been trying to avoid any controversy for now,” adding, “His hands may be tied right now with the nomination of the chief justice’s daughter, but he might call his colleagues to a meeting and let them see things from his own point of view.”
