Kanu Godwin Agabi

Kanu Godwin Agabi, SAN, is a Nigerian lawyer and politician who was a Senator, and was twice Attorney General and Minister of Justice of the federation during the presidency of Olusegun Obasanjo.

Kanu Godwin Agabi
Minister of Justice of Nigeria
In office
June 1999 – January 2000
Preceded byAbdullahi Ibrahim
Succeeded byBola Ige
Minister of Solid Minerals Development
In office
January 2000 – 2002
Preceded byMusa Gwadabe
Minister of Justice of Nigeria
In office
2002–2003
Preceded byBola Ige
Succeeded byBayo Ojo

Kanu was appointed a Senior Advocate of Nigeria on 15 September 1997.[1] In the April 1999 elections, Kanu ran for governor of Cross River State, but was defeated by Donald Duke. He was said to be a candidate for the same position in the 2003 elections.[2]

Minister of Justice

In March 2002, Kanu wrote in a letter to Nigerian state governors that the application of strict Islamic or Sharia law was unconstitutional, since some judgments passed under Sharia discriminated against Muslims.[3] That month, Amina Lawal, a young Nigerian woman accused of giving birth to a child out of wedlock was sentenced to death by stoning, a punishment that was confirmed in August 2002 by a Shari'ah court of appeals in Funtua, Katsina State. Kanu came under pressure from Amnesty International to abolish the death penalty in Nigeria.[4]

In May 2003, the Attorney General urged a Federal High Court in Abuja to order the arrest of the National Assembly leadership, and to imprison them for contempt of the court. He appealed to the court to set aside the anti-graft bill which the National Assembly had passed into law despite a presidential veto.[5]

Later career

In June 2007, Kanu represented the Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC) in a suit filed by General Muhammadu Buhari, the Presidential candidate of the All Nigeria Peoples Party (ANPP), seeking to jail the INEC Chairman Professor Maurice Iwu for refusing to allow Buhari's lawyers access to electoral materials.[6]

In May 2009, Kanu was counsel for the Chairman of the Senate Committee on Power, Nicholas Ugbane, who had been charged by the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) of complicity in defrauding the government of about N5.2 billion earmarked for rural electrification.[7]

gollark: I mean, yes, a good programmer probably *can* get anything done in any language, but some are just worse to work in.
gollark: Hmmmm... no.
gollark: There is much more detailing its many problems.
gollark: That's just a sort of preambley bit.
gollark: ```I can’t even say what’s wrong with PHP, because— okay. Imagine youhave uh, a toolbox. A set of tools. Looks okay, standard stuff inthere.You pull out a screwdriver, and you see it’s one of those weirdtri-headed things. Okay, well, that’s not very useful to you, butyou guess it comes in handy sometimes.You pull out the hammer, but to your dismay, it has the claw part onboth sides. Still serviceable though, I mean, you can hit nails withthe middle of the head holding it sideways.You pull out the pliers, but they don’t have those serratedsurfaces; it’s flat and smooth. That’s less useful, but it stillturns bolts well enough, so whatever.And on you go. Everything in the box is kind of weird and quirky,but maybe not enough to make it completely worthless. And there’s noclear problem with the set as a whole; it still has all the tools.Now imagine you meet millions of carpenters using this toolbox whotell you “well hey what’s the problem with these tools? They’re allI’ve ever used and they work fine!” And the carpenters show you thehouses they’ve built, where every room is a pentagon and the roof isupside-down. And you knock on the front door and it just collapsesinwards and they all yell at you for breaking their door.That’s what’s wrong with PHP.```From the fractal of bad design article.

References
  1. "SENIOR ADVOCATES OF NIGERIA" (PDF). The Nigerian Law Guru. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  2. Joseph Ushigiale (4 October 2002). "Cross River: As the 2003 Battle Rages". ThisDay. Archived from the original on 2005-11-14. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  3. "NIGERIA: Justice minister says Sharia against constitution" (PDF). IAW Newsletter. International Alliance of Women. March–April 2002. Archived from the original (PDF) on 2011-10-02. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  4. "Death by Stoning Upheld in the Case of Nigerian Woman Amina Lawal". EXODUS On-line. 21 August 2002. Archived from the original on 2008-11-20. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  5. "The Revenge of Aremu!:Agabi Wants Anyim, Na'Abba Imprisoned". BNW News. 15 May 2003. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  6. Funso Muraina (15 June 2007). "Contempt - Court Rules On Iwu June 21". ThisDay. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
  7. Lemmy Ughegbe (19 May 2009). "Court remands Ugbane, Elumelu others in Kuje Prison". Guardian. Retrieved 13 February 2010.
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