Chidi Odinkalu and the burden of evidence

Obi Trice Emeka

Professor Chidi Odinkalu is a lawyer, with more than 30 years experience at the Bar, hence he understands more than most of us that conjectures are not facts and he who conjures must prove. Yet, by some happenstance the good old Professor decided to theatrically enter the Anambra political arena, abandoning the lessons he learnt concerning evidence while in Law school and instead chose to become a fictional writer - creating characters and scenes as he deems fit, basically for the sole purpose of revving the emotions of the non discerning.

In deed, since Chidi Odinkalu left his job at the Nigerian Human Rights Commission as its Director General, he appears to be desperately in search of relevance - one which his lacklustre could not could not guarantee him, especially as he woefully failed to stand up to protect the rights of Nigerians during his stint.
Not even victims of the ignoble Ezu River massacre from his home state of Anambra could get a measure of justice under his watch.

But like many former but underperforming government officials seeking fresh 'anointing' it was quite easy for Odinkalu to jump into the exuberance of the social media, making twitter a base from where he churns out falsehood and exaggerating information laced with obfuscating facts at will, in a determined search for redemption.

A simple google search of the name Chidi Odinkalu and fake news readily provides a researcher with plenty of evidence to draw inferences from.

It is, therefore, with this understanding of his social media manipulations in mind that I read his recent article "Ken Nnamani: The Man Who Sold His Conscience."
Lo and behold, Odinkalu did not disappoint.

In tune with his new found pass time, the otherwise erudite Professor went about conjuring his own imagination and baseless innuendos, and went ahead to put them in cold hard print. All with a singular goal in mind: Take down Senator Andy Uba who apparently is the target of the article deceitfully passed off as targeted at Ken Nnamani, if his working title is anything to go by.

Reading through the entire stuff, it would be very easy to come to the befuddling conclusion that the Odinkalu article was a hatchet job, simplicita!

But quite unlike our Professor, I love to follow the evidence and not rely on giddy assumptions. Yet, in trying not to stray off course, my curiosity remained fired regarding why a supposed intellectual would centre his piece on the whimsical premise of 'guilty by association'.

Furthermore, in choosing to publish the work in Authority Newspaper, owned by Senator Ifeanyi Ubah, himself a gubernatorial candidate in the forthcoming Anambra governorship election, speaks volumes about it's intention and purpose.

Could it have been that our dear Professor was afflicted by selective amnesia, to the point that he conveniently forgot who and what the character Ifeanyi Ubah represents - or was it simply a case of the voice of Esau and the hands of Jacob?

For starters, Sen. Uba worked as Special Assistant to President Olusegun Obasanjo on Special Duties, and not as Domestic Aide as Odinkalu derisively and falsely claimed in his article.

In fact, as many other authors, who were first hand witnesses to the botched third term attempt under the President Olusegun Obasanjo administration had recounted, Senator Uba was never made out as the force behind any such attempt.

Odinkalu, never a member of the National Assembly must have invented this seemingly 'great' evidence from his deep well of imaginative writing.

Another point of note is, how a supposed Professor of Law would transfer the burden of President Olusegun Obasanjo's obsessions with a third term to a mere Special Assistant. In deed, this must be the ninth wonder of the world and a curious case of seeking to turn logic on its head, all in an attempt to give a man a bad name in other to frighten him off the public arena.

To say, for instance, that Prof. Maurice Iwu's appointment as head of the country's electoral body was a gift by President Obasanjo to Senator Uba for his assistance in the hugely disputed third term bid is another proof that Professors can be knowingly mischievous and those who know Odinkalu need to offer him help and save him from further hallucinations.

Without a doubt, the 2007 general elections was the worst of its kind since our country's return to democratic rule in 1999 - a fact readily attested to by no less a personality than the late President Musa Yar'Adua.

But Odinkalu in his usual manner of obfuscating facts has centred the problems associated with the 2007 general elections on Anambra, in a blind fury to get at Andy Uba.

As someone who headed the Nigerian Human Rights Commission, Odinkalu ought to have been abreast of the Human Rights Watch report of the election across the federation.

Even late President Yar'Adua's open admittance in full public glare that the election that brought him into office was flawed was too insignificant for Odinkalu to acknowledge. For as far as he is concerned, Andy Uba and no one else must be maligned and made to carry the can for what was obviously a national problem.

Although Odinkalu has since gone ahead to make friends with many of those who won in the same elections of 2007 and has stridently defended them ever since, he shamelessly elects to adorn the toga of a hypocrite who must single out an Andy Uba for constant vilification.

As for his dabbling into the issue of the All Progressives Congress, APC primaries, need I remind this meddlesome interloper of a Professor, that they are basically the internal affairs of political parties, and they do have legally approved channels of resolving disputes which arise therefrom.

In deed, the Nigerian constitution recognises party primaries as solely internal party affairs.

True, the Anambra APC Primary wasn't perfect, just like that of both the People's Democratic Party, PDP and the All Progressives Grand Alliance, APGA, yet Odinkalu finds it quite comforting to dwell only on the outcome of the APC exercise.
Talk of sour grapes.

The elderly wisdom of Ken Nnamani has ensured that the APC family in Anambra is still one big family, as his fatherly disposition helped ensure that the party's internal mechanism for resolving grievances was fully deployed, leading to only but two of the 17 aspirants leaving the APC to try their electoral luck elsewhere.

Odinkalu is quite aware that the issues relating to the APC primary are presently in court, yet he decides to prejudice the courts by stating that the APC held no primary election.

It's also instructive to mention that at no time did INEC state that the APC held no primary. INEC never reached such conclusions, for if it did, the APC would not have been listed as participant for the November 6, 2021 gubernatorial contest.

Senator Uba's Campaign continues to permeate the grassroots, as those who gave him no chance are beginning to eat their words, and have rather joined hands with him to rescue Anambra from emotional extortionists whose track records are embedded in blackmail. Those, who remain obstinate for one pecuniary reason or the other have continued to go haywire as they employ all manners of tactics, including hiring all manner of hack writers to defuse his rising acceptance among voters.

One note of caution, however: Ndi Anambra know this weather beaten song, but this time, they are sworn not to dance to the hackneyed footsteps of writers of bad verses.

Yea