On Thursday, February 20, 2014, President Goodluck Jonathan, by virtue of a letter signed by the Secretary to the Government of the Federation and read out to the press by the chief media adviser to the President, removed the Governor of the Central Bank of Nigeria (CBN) from office by way of a suspension.

Relations between Mr. Sanusi Lamido Sanusi, Governor of the CBN, and President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan had grown steadily cold over time. But things clearly came to a head when Mr. Sanusi’s letter to the President about some missing 49 billion dollars in oil revenue supposed to have been remitted to the Federation Account by the Nigerian National Petroleum Corporation (NNPC) was leaked to the press. The presidency accused Mr. Sanusi of leaking such a sensitive letter to the press with an intention to embarrass the Government.

Though Mr. Sanusi denied that allegation, there was no love lost between the presidency and the CBN Governor. Tension cascaded. The President summoned Mr. Sanusi to a meeting, in which the President demanded that Sanusi resign from office. But Sanusi refused to resign, and chose to complete his term in office, which would come to an end in June of 2014. Stories continued to make the rounds both in the press and within Government circles that the NNPC, the Nigerian Government entity responsible for managing Nigeria’s large oil wealth, had withheld from the treasury billions of dollars.

Nigerian Senate immediately commenced hearings on the allegations of the missing billions. Officials of the NNPC, the Ministry of Finance, the CBN and even the Attorney General, all appeared to testify before the Senate. At these hearings, it was clear to all that several billions had mysteriously disappeared and that the NNPC withheld such funds that ought to have been remitted to the treasury. The latest of these hearings took place only about a week before the removal of Sanusi.

Immediately upon the purported removal of Sanusi, the legality of that act became an issue. Central to the controversy is the law on the matter, which specified that the CBN Governor could be removed by the President but must be with two-third-majority vote of the Senate. President Jonathan’s men recognise that law and actually acknowledged its place. However, they argued that Mr. Sanusi was only “suspended” and not “removed”.

There is only one legal issue at stake: whether the term “removal” as used in the law would include “suspension”. This ought to have been a fairly straightforward argument when you take into cognizance the mischief behind the need for the Senate vote for removal of the CBN Governor. However, like most things in Nigeria, this simple problem turns out not simple enough.

Those against the actions of the presidency contend that suspension is actually the means of “removal” and that the attempt to remove Sanusi, whether by suspension or any other means of removing a person from office, would violate the law. This writer subscribes to this view. Indeed, there are several ways to remove a person from office. “Removing” a person from office can occur by: (a) transferring him against his will, (b) suspending him against his will, (c) arresting and detaining him against his will, (d) promoting him against his will, etc, provided that such change in his status was done against his will.

Note the case of Justice Salami, former President of Nigerian Court of Appeal. He was “promoted” from the Court of Appeal to the Supreme Court. But he refused. They did not force him to accept his promotion because that would amount to removal contrary to law.

What happened between President Jonathan and Mr. Sanusi has a precedent elsewhere in the world. That is the tumultuous events that occurred in Pakistan between President Purvez Musharraf and the Pakistani Chief Justice, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry. The facts are very startlingly identical.

According a source at the US Library of Congress: “On March 9, 2007, the President of Pakistan, General Purvez Musharraf, met the Chief Justice of the Pakistan Supreme Court, Iftikhar Muhammad Chaudhry, and reportedly importuned him to resign…

“The Chief Justice’s act of refusal against a generally powerful executive, and in the face of pressure, is unheard of in Pakistan, which has seen no less than four military regimes ruling the country for significant periods during its sixty-year history. In that time, executive-judicial relations have been strained and numerous judges have been removed, despite protective provisions provided in Pakistan’s present Constitution, promulgated in 1973. A number of judges have resigned in the face of court-packing, reductions in retirement ages, requirements to take fresh oaths, and other tactics of the government of the day.

“President Musharraf is stated to have asked the Chief Justice to resign, based on grounds of alleged misconduct, in the presence of Prime Minister Shaukat Aziz and six other uniformed generals. The Chief Justice’s reported refusal resulted in his virtual suspension and becoming “non-functional.” At the same time, President Musharraf also invoked his authority under Article 209 of the oft-patched 1973 Constitution of Pakistan to refer the alleged abuses of office by the Chief Justice to a Supreme Judicial Council (Council). This is the first time that a Chief Justice has been made “non-functional.” Soon after, an Acting Chief Justice was sworn-in in a hastily arranged ceremony.”

As happened in the case of the Pakistan’s Chief Justice, future events in Sanusi’s case will depend on the following factors: (1) POPULAR SUPPORT: The popularity of the Pakistani Chief Justice was immense and his purported removal “unleashed an unprecedented revolt led by Pakistani lawyers in support of judicial independence and the rule of law in Pakistan”. Mr. Sanusi, on the other hand, does not appear to be as popular as the Pakistani Chief Justice.

Sanusi is perceived to be too cocky, too confident and too vocal. Also, he is a victim of ethnic and religious divisions in the country. Not only is he from the Muslim North, he is from a ruling family in Kano. He angered many Christians from the South, particularly the East and South East, when he donated money from the coffers of the Central Bank to the victims of a terrorist attack in his home city, Kano, but was not able to repeat that gesture for other victims attacked in other parts of the country. His generosity was thus perceived to be biased and sectional.

While Sanusi is without much support in the Christian south of Nigeria, he is probably popular in the Muslim north. Though not as vocal and media active as the southerners, the northern communities are fairly better organised and more resolved. So, despite the vituperations Sanusi has received in social media and blogs owned and controlled by people from the southern part of Nigeria, Mr. Sanusi will have the support of most northerners over this matter.

(2) THE STATE OF THE LAW: Nigeria is a relatively new comer to constitutionalism. A basic constitutional issue, such as the relationship between the President and the Central Bank Governor, is largely unresolved in Nigeria. Indeed, this is the first time this sort of problem is arising in Nigeria. Despite any gaps or murkiness in the law, the Nigerian judges have shown on many occasions that they are capable of filling these gaps and straightening out the creases in the law. It is expected that the final outcome would be determined not by the wishes of the President, but by the judgments of the courts. There was thus not much surprise when within 24 hours Mr. Sanusi obtained an order of the court restraining the Nigerian security agents from arresting, detaining, harassing or intimidating him.

(3) THE STATE OF POLITICS IN NIGERIA: At present, the Nigerian political atmosphere is charged and getting worse. The President’s party is not as strong as it used to be. The opposition is much stronger with the merger of three parties into one, with a short-lived switch of congressional majority from the ruling party to the opposition in the lower house of legislature. The opposition would exploit this incident to attack President Jonathan’s record for rule of law and the fight against corruption.

(4) HOW NIGERIA’S INTERNATIONAL PARTNERS REACT: Sanusi is viewed favourably in most financial centres of the world. He is perceived as intelligent and a reformer. His removal appears to be interpreted against the President of Nigeria. It presents Nigerian Government as not being serious with its economic reform agenda and the fight against corruption. Indeed, the news of the removal of Sanusi caused a sharp drop in the value of naira relative to the dollar. President Jonathan cannot afford to ignore the feelings of the world concerning this.

(5) THE STATUS OF THE 20 BILLION DOLLARS SAID TO BE MISSING: Despite the cacophony of reactions over the removal of Sanusi, it is expected that it would not be enough to drown the questions about the missing 20 billion dollars. At some point in this story, there will be a shift of attention to the missing money. Nigerians would like to know how it happened and what happened to the money. This is where Sanusi may have his vindication. If the President or his close associates in Government are implicated in the missing money, that could turn Sanusi into a national hero.

It is too early to predict with any degree of certainty the outcome of this standoff. But it behooves the President not to allow this to escalate further. It is unfortunate that the search for the missing billions is getting mired in toxic partisanship along ethnic and religious lines. President Jonathan must try to save his country such a costly descent into chaos.

•Emeka Ugwuonye, Esquire, lawyer and activist, whose photo appears alongside this piece, writes from Maryland, USA.

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