Malami opens up on resigning as Minister

The Attorney General of the Federation (AGF) and Minister of Justice, Abubakar Malami (SAN), on Thursday said he has not resigned from office as reported in some quarters.

He said this at the annual media conference organised by the National Association of Judiciary Correspondents (NAJUC) held in Abuja.

The Minister said: “Some unprofessional information disseminators will be taken aback that the Malami that was claimed to have resigned was seen in office discharging his functions including attending the Federal Executive Council (FEC) meeting yesterday (Wednesday), granting interviews to journalists and still today (Thursday) declaring this conference open as the AGF”.

He appealed to journalists to refrain from “fake news, defamation, sedition, hate speech, blasphemy, and incitements of inflammatory statements in their reportage.”

He also urged against being conscripted by “agents of destruction” to spread false information about personalities and issues.

He warned there would be consequences for the conduct of the journalists that offer themselves to used “by agents of destruction that make it their stock in trade to spread fake information about personalities and issues.”

“Effective legislative framework may be a considerable option. It is high time that we enhance media literacy for Nigerians to appreciate fact-checking and verification of information”, the Minister stated.

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The Conference, with the theme “The Judiciary and 2023 General Elections: The Way Forward”, and “Stemming the Tide of Conflicting Judgments in Nigeria’s Judicial System, Enforcement of Court Judgments: The Obstacles, the Remedies” as Sub-themes, he said, was intended to enhance the skill of Judiciary Correspondents and facilitate effective discharge of their responsibilities as journalists and important members of the society.

The AGF said, it has been the desire of the Federal Government to tame the tide of conflicting judgments and implore due diligence in the judicial process.

“Our struggles in the P&ID case symbolize the due diligence policy of the Federal Government as well as the need to address judgment debt in the interest of the Nigerian public. This has been our position on a number of current national issues”.

The AGF’s office, he said, always insists on “due diligence, assiduous scrutiny as well as beyond-reasonable-doubt exploration and meticulous examinations in our policy to bequeath the posterity a sound and impeccable precedents in determination of issues. It is unfortunate that these legally recognized processes that we strive to strictly adhere to are misconstrued by mischievous publications to convey negative undertones”.