Saraba 12 - The Justice Issue

all. Then, the prosecutor smiled at Ejike and asked him, what his motives were while making the video; and if he knew that putting the video on YouTube was a breach of the complainant’s rights. The prosecutor also asked him if he had tried to dissuade his friends.

“They’re not my friends.” Ejike replied in a low, stiff and merciless tone.

“They are not your friends?” She asked in a high voice.

“Yes.” “Then what were you doing at the crime scene? Why was your car used to convey the complainant to the crime scene?

Why didn’t you try to dissuade your… colleagues or partners? What was the video to you?”

Eze sprang from his seat as briskly as one with fire on his buttocks would. I smiled each time he leapt in this manner to raise an objection. The Judge overruled Eze’s objection.

“Chuka Nwigwe’s family and mine have been close friends a long time. He asked to use the car for a ‘personal business’, and I couldn’t say no. You see. The Nwigwes lost their father years ago. Since then, their mother has toiled and struggled to fend for them; the family has had to lift themselves by the bootstraps. It’s difficult to say ‘no’ to them.”

“Was that why you didn’t try to help the complainant?

Because her father was still alive?” The prosecutor brushed off the imaginary tufts of hair from her temple.

“There was nothing I could do. There were laid out plans. The boys were intoxicated and their minds, set. What could I have done? Madam, if you saw five armed soldiers coming at your best friend, and you were standing by, what would you do?”

There was silence for a while. The court stared at the 26 of 93