The demise of His Lordship, the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais, GCON, on the day of Eid Al Adha, June 6, 2025, is a testament to His Lordship’s many good deeds.

I recall my first encounter with the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, with nostalgia. It was my first case at the Supreme Court of Nigeria, in Appeal No. SC. 99/1989 – J. B. Atunrase & 4 others V. Samuel Charles Oladipo Phillips & 8 others, which I “inherited” from Chief Samuel Olasupo Morohundiya (of blessed memory) and in which I was counsel to the 3rd to 6th Respondents. The case, which was decided while I was still under ten years at the Bar, is reported as ATUNRASE VS. PHILLIP (1996) 1 NWLR (PART 427) PAGE 637 (SC). My Lords, Muhammadu Lawal Uwais, C.J.N. (Presided), Michael Ekundayo Ogundare, J.S.C. (Read the Leading Judgment), Uthman Mohammed, J.S.C., Yekini Olayinka Adio, J.S.C., Anthony Ikechukwu Iguh, J.S.C., heard the appeal and delivered judgment in favour of the Respondents on Tuesday, 16th January, 1996.

I was too soon to be later formally welcomed to the Supreme Court of Nigeria by my Lord, the Honourable, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, at the hallowed Chambers of the Supreme Court anytime I appeared, following my role as the Coordinating Secretary of the Committee of Chairmen and Secretaries of the Nigerian Bar Association Branches between 1996 to 1998 under the Chairmanship of Asiwaju Chief Solomon Adegboyega Awomolo SAN.

May Allah grant the good, kind and gentle soul of the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais aljanah fir’daus, Ameen.

His Lordship, the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais, the Honourable, the Chief Justice of Nigeria and his brother Justices of the apex court gave every support to the work of the Committee of Chairmen and Secretaries of the Nigerian Bar Association which culminated with the successful hosting on Friday, 28 August, 1998,  of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) Conference held at the Abuja Sheraton Hotel at which the Nigerian Bar Association was brought back after the 1992 Port Harcourt crises of the Nigerian Bar Association.

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Apart from his Lordship’s brilliance and services to the nation at the Supreme Court and as the Honourable, the Chief Justice of Nigeria, the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais rose to the call of President, His Excellency, Alhaji Umaru Musa Yar’Adua, GCFR who on 28th August 2007 inaugurated a 22-member Electoral Reform Committee, of which the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais was Chairman, to “examine the entire electoral process with a view of ensuring that we raise the quality and standard of our general elections and thereby deepen our democracy”. The report of the Committee, popularly referred to as the “Justice Uwais Panel report”, submitted in December 2008, though not publicly implemented, has been acclaimed as being far-reaching. I, however, know as the President of the University of Benin Alumni Association in 2007 that the Council of the University of Benin Alumni Association passed a resolution which was sent to the Justice Uwais Panel as it relates to the avoidance of Oath of Office being administered to a person who wins a re-run election to the Office of President or Governor.  It is not too late to implement the Justice Uwais Panel report.

His Lordship had in 1997 encouraged me to apply for the prestigious rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria (SAN), but I did not. I am happy that His Lordship, the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais was alive in 2020 when I eventually made the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria, to justify His Lordship’s faith in me.

May Allah grant the good, kind and gentle soul of the Honourable Justice Muhammadu Lawal Uwais aljanah fir’daus, Ameen.

Adieu to a fine jurist and gentleman.

*Ahonaruogho is a Senior Advocate of Nigeria, SAN.

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Uwais passed on on Friday at the age of 89.

In a statement he personally signed, the president said he joined family members, friends, proteges and well-meaning Nigerians in mourning the respected patriot and statesman.

He stated that many remarkable highpoints hallmarked Uwais’ illustrious career on the bench.

The president said Uwais superintended the Judiciary at a challenging time in our history with tact, patience, and a sense of duty.

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The stabilising role, the president, said, helped usher in the current democratic dispensation, which he had the distinct honour of ushering in as the Chief Justice of Nigeria, who swore in the elected president on May 29, 1999.

The president stated further:

“In retirement, the Federal Government called upon Justice Uwais to head a panel to investigate the conduct of our elections. Given his pedigree and personal integrity, he was the right person for that onerous assignment.

“Not surprisingly, Justice Uwais led the panel to produce a critical report that contained a detailed prognosis of our electoral system.

“In active service and retirement, the late Justice Uwais maintained a dignified persona, earning him respect beyond his immediate constituency.”

President Tinubu prayed: “May God Almighty accept the soul of Justice Uwais and admit him to Jannatul Firdaus.”

He extended his condolences to the Uwais family, the government and the people of Kaduna State, as well as the members of the Nigerian Judiciary, over Uwais’ death.

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The call was made on Wednesday in Abuja during an anti-corruption radio programme, Public Conscience, produced by the Progressive Impact Organization for Community Development, PRIMORG.

This development follows a recent investigative report published by the Center for Collaborative Investigative Journalism, CCIJ, which exposed how thousands of altered voting tallies and mutilated figures were successfully uploaded to the result portal of the Independent National Electoral Commission, INEC, during the 2023 presidential elections in Nigeria.

Speaking during the programme, the Executive Director of Alliance for Inclusive Development—AidAfrica, James Ugochukwu, called on the members of the National Assembly to ensure electoral reform processes were concluded before the end of 2025 to give room for adoption and test runs before the next general elections.

Ugochukwu advised that all the reforms the legislators looked forward to are contained in Justice Uwais’s report on electoral reform and other previous national conferences, warning that between now and June 2025 is the best period for electoral reforms rather than close to the 2027 elections.

He called for the rejigging and reorganizing of INEC as part of the reforms, and a review of the technological failures of the Bimodal Voter Accreditation System (BVAS) and the Result Viewing Portal (IREV) experienced during the last presidential election.

He added that the IREV should be part of the Electoral Act and upgraded to reject mutilated and blurry electoral documents uploaded in the 2023 general and subsequent off-cycle polls.

“About the snail pace of the electoral reform process by the National Assembly, there is nothing we want in the Electoral Act that has not been proffered by Justice Uwais’s report or the National Confab, so we should stop wasting taxpayers’ money trying to do any electoral reform process in the National Assembly.

“What should be done is to converge all stakeholders – Nigeria Bar Association, Nigeria Union of Journalists, the Civil Society, the election management body, and security agencies in a conference.

“Electoral reform should be quick, and we should be able to have a new Electoral Act, give or take the middle of this year ahead of 2027 –  because a lot of things need to be done well. For instance, now INEC should be able to decide if the IREV portal will just be a result viewing portal or a result collation portal recognized by the law.”

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Ugochukwu lauded PRIMORG for organising the radio programme and sustaining the pressure on the government and federal legislators to prioritize electoral integrity and reforms.

For his part, the Africa Editor, CCIJ, Ajibola Amzat, backed the call for electoral reforms and the implementation of the Uwais Commission report ahead of future elections and 2027 polls, adding that reform should be used to strike out the president’s prerogative to appoint the chairman of INEC as he could be a beneficiary of the same system.

Amzat stressed that the integrity crisis in Nigeria’s elections is caused by the failure to punish electoral offences over the years and worsening weak institutions.

Reflecting on the CCIJ’s report on the irregularities allegedly undermining the 2023 presidential poll, he disclosed that INEC violated legal and constitutional instruments guiding elections.

Additionally, Amzat revealed that the electoral body was unable to answer questions about altered figures and blurry documents submitted on IREV and claimed that IREV is currently inaccessible to the general public.

“I’m in support of reforms. Interestingly, Nigeria has one of the finest laws guiding elections; it is just that the laws are paper tigers. They are good on paper but not good on enforcement.

“I agree that the appointment of the INEC Chair should not be the decision of the president, who is also likely to be a beneficiary of the election.

“The INEC needs to know that the law is not for decorations; instead, it has to be enforced. How many people have been prosecuted for the crimes committed in the last elections?

“The constitution, the electoral law, the INEC guidelines, the international protocols, each of these legal instruments were violated during the last general elections, and counting votes during the elections. From our (CCIJ) checks, we found a lot of irregularities during the 2023 presidential poll,” Amzat lamented.

On deepening the use of technology in Nigeria’s elections, he said, “I think technology is still going to play a part in every key development, so I think we need to make technology work for us. You know technology can be a good tool and a weapon as well, a weapon against the integrity of the people, so it depends on how you use technology.”

Public Conscience is a syndicated weekly anti-corruption radio programme, PRIMORG, that draws the attention of the government and citizens to corruption and integrity issues in Nigeria.

The programme runs in partnership with the MacArthur Foundation.

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