By Umaru Fofana
For the second day running I sat there. From the press gallery I watched as some would err. Ere it was Tuesday. Then came Wednesday. In the Supreme Court sat I. Last time I was there a stake had I. Challenging the legality of criminal and seditious libel law when exists free speech in our main law. Our constitution. About the lead up to that I still have compunction. Justice whither art thou.
This time I am less involved. Impartiality I have not devolved. But I cannot help but notice the contrast between then and now and between the outside and the inside of the courtroom. For now, let me deal with the now. Freedom and servitude. Cool breeze and scorching heat. Freestyle wear and strict dress code. Coats and silky gowns and wigs. Those with long scrawny necks are probably blessed. Breeze escapes through their oversized shirt collar.
But while the bats were enjoying their freestyles and the breeze, those inside the courtroom were enduring the heat. I could not help but ask myself why the wig and the suits and the gown. I read somewhere that “Court dress is worn at hearings in open court in all Senior Courts of England and Wales and in county courts. However, court dress may be dispensed with at the option of the judge, e.g. in very hot weather, and invariably where it may intimidate children, e.g. in the family division and at the trials of minors.” Among other things this tells us that the British colonialists brought this court dress here because of their weather. So can we not adapt to our weather in prescribing our dress code.
And I also saw this: “In the Federal Court of Australia, judges no longer wear traditional court dress”. Buried we are in colonial mentality in everything we do. So what are we waiting for in this 30-degree Celsius weather condition in courtrooms that have poor ventilation?
From where I sat I could see. On the branches of the iconic Cotton Tree. Perched and sang and gambolled hundreds of bats. In amusement I could not even my eyes bat. They must have been having fun and frolic. Inside the courtroom was, for some, some colic. Outside was anxiety. Among the panel of five eminent judges was, possibly, apprehension presumably uncertainty. And at some point I envied not their position.
A lawyer for the petitioners argued…sorry…talked. Talked and talked and talked. Self-repeated, self-repeated and self-repeated. Intelligence aplenty. But boredom galore, too. The judges looked on. Understandably perhaps they did not wade in. If they were hard with him, all hell would break loose. “It is because they are representing the opposition”, you bet some would say. And the courtroom was packed full with an overwhelmingly partisan audience. The murmuring would be too loud to hear anything the lawyers or judges would be saying, even with the help of the eclectic public address system that makes more noise than amplifies what is being said.
That notwithstanding, and very calmly, the lady chief justice would call the lawyer to order. Not so calmly Justice Hamilton would him order.
Such is the freedom they enjoyed as I looked at them that the bats were flying without leaving their perch. Probably because bats cannot see. But justice has eyes and can see. Or so should it be. The 5-member Supreme Court panel, as constituted, is one of very few places of leadership and authority in Sierra Leone where women dominate. Impressive. As the three ladies looked on, some not too enthusiastically, some lawyers were nodding. If only cameras were allowed in the room.
That freedom of the bats outside can be imagined only by some opposition members not inside. Restricted by the police from getting any close to the court. I even saw two of them being beaten. One of them a woman. Robbed of their dignity. The opposition say eleven were arrested and one so badly beaten that they were admitted to the emergency hospital. Yes they attempted to breach security set up by the police. That was uncalled for. Unnecessary! Unjustifiable! But are our courts no-go areas by people wishing to attend proceedings? We saw hundreds mobilised during the corruption trial of Haja Affsatu Kabbah which was NOT a political matter. Corruption! And they entered the courtroom or laid siege downstairs. The petition case involving the SLPP this time is clearly a political one. You spot the difference.
That said, the SLPP should have urged their supporters not to breach the security cordon and so avoid any skirmish with the police. It has been said time and again that the crowd control mechanism by our police is poor. Like the carpenter who sees a nail and a hammer as the solution to every problem, our cops are always combative even in the face of a pro-police protest. This has to stop.
But perhaps the mad rush to go to court would have been avoided if the judiciary had shed off its ultra-conservative approach to its modus operandi. Our judiciary is implacably opposed to allowing a live broadcast of any of their proceedings. I understand the limitations to such media access to a court room such as for the safety and security of the judges and the fact that some lawyers will argue to the gallery and grandstand. But exceptions are allowed in many other countries. For example the ongoing presidential election petition ongoing in Ghana is being aired live on radio and television. The same happened in Kenya during theirs. Perhaps if that access was open there would be no mad rush by opposition supporters leading to the lockdown central Freetown has had to endure, or the brutality opposition supporters have had to go through. After all this trial is about the people’s vote. Why keep it away from them!
Tell it to the general public who have had to spend hours to make it through a five-minute drive. Or to some innocent passers-by whom the police would shout or flex their muscles at or even humiliate at the slightest glitch or for an inch.
But blame it not all on the police. Our judiciary should be scrutinised. Or are we not aware of how justice is sometimes being suffocated. The appointment of judges by the President is suspect. The appointment of retired judges to stay on is compromising. The method of promoting magistrates to the high court can be corrupting. The signing of bench warrants judges for the arrest of a citizen who poses no flight risk at all is corrupt. Especially so when such judges or magistrates do not even assess the case before issuing such.
Unlike, or may be like, the bird in Lord Tennyson’s poem THE EAGLE, each of the bats on our Cotton Tree “clasps the crag with crooked hands; Close to the sun in lonely lands, Ring'd with the azure world, he stands. The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls; He watches from his mountain walls, And like a thunderbolt he falls”.
Our bats may they never fall. Neither like thunderbolt nor like a feather. But while the bats fly without flying away, it shows there is still peace in the air. In January 1999 they flew and fled. Peace had been compromised. May the peace of those bats, I pray, be spared now and forever. Only peace and justice for all and sundry can bring that about. If only the judges would intermittently be looking outside of their window or listening to the bats sing…
