An eminent Human Rights Lawyer, Femi Falana, SAN has distanced himself from a statement credited to Chief Akintola, SAN making the rounds in the media that both learned silks (Falana and Akintola) advised Buhari to suspend rule of law to effectively fight corruption.
Falana, SAN denied ever given such an advice.
“I was flabbergasted when my attention was drawn to this publication last year. I was compelled to dissociate myself from the views ascribed to me in the interview on the grounds that Chief Niyi Akintola SAN and I have never attended any meeting together in Washington before.
Having consistently campaigned for the defence of democracy, rule of law and human rights in Africa for over 3 decades I have never joined Chief Akintola SAN to advise the Buhari regime to put human rights in abeyance under the pretext of fighting corruption.” Femi Falana SAN said.
Akintola, SAN had during an interview with the Nigerian Tribune in 2016 on the raiding of the houses of judges by the DSS published in http://www.tribuneonlineng.com/asked-buhari-suspend-rule-law-one-year-fight-corruption-niyi-akintola-san/ advised that Buhari should suspend Rule.
Akintola, SAN reportedly said:
“we were in Washington DC, United States of America and for six days, the issue of corruption in Nigeria came to the fore. It was not limited to Nigeria. Femi Falana and I stood up for our president and his modus operandi in faraway Washington. It is not that we love some of his tactics but we thought that a drastic problem requires a drastic solution….”
He added that “All our president needs to do is to go to the National Assembly, call the state Houses of Assembly, more so now that governors are telling him to declare the state of emergency on the economy. He can bring in the issue of corruption and ask that we suspend the rule of law for one year because a drastic problem requires a drastic solution and Femi Falana supported me.”
