Former Justice Minister Malami: Even If This Is a “Witch-Hunt,” Why Does Justice Look So Much Like Injustice in Our Nation?

A Nation Looking Back at 2015–2023 With Pain, Questions — and a Bitter Reality

From 2015 to 2023, Nigeria lived under one of the most powerful legal regimes in its history. The Office of the Attorney-General controlled prosecutions, influenced investigations, shaped legal direction, and carried the symbolic heart of justice.

Today, as allegations surround former Minister of Justice Abubakar Malami, the nation is forced to revisit those eight years — not only with anger, and not only with fear of political “witch-hunts,” but with a brutal moral realization:

Even if this entire process were politically motivated, my God, look at what a Justice Minister allowed to grow under his watch.

Because politics may explain timing.

But politics cannot explain:

the properties,

the proxies,

the financial networks,

the unexplained accumulations.

Even if someone shouts witch-hunt, the deeper wound remains:

What happened to justice during those years?

How did truth become something supervised instead of something free?

How did the nation end up with a Justice Ministry so surrounded by suspicion?

This moment is not only political.

It is psychological — a country realizing that even where bias may exist, the conduct itself still stains the conscience of the nation.

When the Story Stops Being About Politics and Becomes About the Soul of a Country

The EFCC has filed charges, traced properties, listed transactions. Courts will debate legality. Lawyers will battle narratives. Politicians will shape explanations.

But beneath all that lies something deeper:

Nigerians are emotionally tired of leaders whose stories always seem to wander toward the shadows.

So when people say, “This is political,” another question quietly rises:

If it is political — why does it still look believable?

That question exposes a crisis far beyond one individual. It reveals the erosion of trust. And trust, once broken in matters of justice, does not easily return.

The Iceberg Nobody Wants to Look At

Psychology teaches that the moment of exposure is rarely the moment the crisis began. Exposure is simply when the hidden becomes undeniable.

What we see today — indictments, asset tracing, dramatic court appearances — is only the tip of a long economic and ethical iceberg.

The deeper crisis began years earlier:

when oversight weakened,

when loyalty replaced principle,

when power began to believe it was immune to accountability.

Even if these charges evaporate tomorrow, the emotional damage will not disappear. Nigerians have learned to expect disappointment — and that expectation is deadlier than any single scandal.

A nation should be shocked by corruption.

It should not feel trained to anticipate it.

Power Without Restraint Slowly Becomes Culture — 2015 to 2023

Across those eight years, something subtle but corrosive developed:

an environment where leaders acted first and explained later,

a feeling that institutions existed to serve authority rather than citizens,

a culture where accountability seemed optional if one stood high enough in power.

I am not saying every action taken was wrong.

I am saying the psychological climate shifted.

When citizens repeatedly see law applied sharply to the weak and softly to the powerful, they stop believing justice is neutral. And a society that stops believing in justice begins to suffocate emotionally.

When Power Begins to Believe It Will Last Forever

The EFCC filings describe transactions routed through companies, associates, and layered financial structures — systems designed to create distance between actor and benefit.

These do not reflect accident. They suggest planning.

And one painful question emerges:

Did office begin to feel permanent?

Did those years cultivate the illusion that scrutiny would never return, that the law could always be negotiated, delayed, redirected?

Power does something dangerous to the human mind. It whispers:

“You are protected. You are different. You are beyond consequence.”

But truth is relentless. Cabinets dissolve. Records remain. Investigators change. History returns.

And when it does, even the most carefully hidden arrangements begin to speak.

That is the moment Nigeria is witnessing.

Counting Mansions While Counting the Hungry

Numbers like billions and multiple properties are not intellectual concepts in Nigeria — they are emotional wounds.

They echo in communities where mothers sell food by the roadside, children walk barefoot to survive, and graduates drive tricycles because dreams collapsed along the way.

So when citizens hear of enormous wealth linked to the office responsible for justice, something inside them breaks:

a spiritual dislocation.

It feels as if justice was not a moral duty, but a personal opportunity.

It feels as if fairness was never meant for everyone.

And that fracture — not merely poverty — damages the national soul.

When Accountability Is Reframed as Personal Drama

When powerful people face investigation, the focus easily shifts from issues to investigators:

allegations of bias,

claims of vendetta,

stories of persecution.

Suddenly, instead of asking “What happened?”, the conversation becomes “Who is doing this to me?”

But Nigerians are not naïve. They know one truth:

Arguments about bias do not explain unexplained wealth.

They do not erase ownership documents.

They do not dismantle properties.

So the deeper question lingers:

Why does justice seem to awaken only when political winds change, instead of consistently standing on principle?

That inconsistency corrodes belief more than any legal accusation ever could.

The Law Turning Toward Its Former Custodian

There is something haunting about seeing the legal system now turn toward someone who once directed it.

This is not triumph.

This is tragedy — and a form of institutional self-examination.

Many ordinary Nigerians endured harsh justice without influence, wealth, or protection. They now watch as that same system faces someone who shaped it.

History has circled back, not to humiliate — but to remind:

the law belongs to the nation, not to its temporary custodians.

The Message Our Youth Are Absorbing — and Why It Terrifies Me

Young Nigerians are watching.

If they walk away believing leadership means accumulation without consequence, justice becomes performance, and public office means extraction — then the future darkens.

But if they witness something different:

power humbled,

law applied without fear,

truth upheld regardless of position,

then a new psychological foundation begins to form — fragile, but real.

Our children are learning from this moment. We cannot fail them again.

EFCC Standing Between Doubt and Redemption

Nigerians remember EFCC’s past controversies — selective prosecutions, political whispers, uneven energy.

Those memories are valid.

Yet today, EFCC stands inside a rare historical doorway: confronting someone who once stood above them. That does not mean perfection. It means courage struggling to grow.

The task before them is simple and difficult:

act lawfully,

document carefully,

avoid theatrics,

respect rights,

but never retreat from truth.

If they succeed, Nigeria gains something priceless:

credible justice.

Not flawless — credible.

And that difference is the beginning of institutional healing.

The Judiciary Standing Between Loyalty and Legacy

Judges now carry an immeasurable burden. Many will feel external pressure, internal conflict, silent intimidation, promises, and fears.

Yet history will ask only one question:

Did you defend power — or did you defend the Republic?

The courtroom is the moral sanctuary of a nation. If it bends repeatedly, society fractures. If it stands, hope returns.

The courage required at this moment is not legal skill — it is moral backbone.

He Is Not Alone — And That Is the Real Frightening Part

Let us be honest.

Malami is not the only powerful figure whose story bends toward suspicion. Nigeria has shaped a political climate where allies often chase one another into court — not necessarily because integrity finally rose, but because power shifted.

He is not the disease.

He is a symptom of it.

He was once simply a lawyer — an ordinary professional inside the same justice system he would later command.

The question that haunts me as a psychologist is:

What happens inside the minds of our leaders after power arrives?

When does responsibility shift into entitlement?

When does public duty convert into personal empire?

When do once-ordinary men begin to believe they are immune to consequence?

If we fail to answer that question, we will simply keep replacing names — while the sickness endures.

A Father’s Shadow — And a Son Who Should Never Have Been There

There is an image from this saga that is unforgettable:

A father and a son standing side-by-side in the dock, both remanded to prison.

As I write, they remain in custody.

And I cannot escape this heartbreaking truth:

That young man might never have seen a prison cell if not for the world his father created around him.

Power draws families into spaces they do not fully understand — signatory roles, company positions, property names. Suddenly, a child becomes tied to choices he did not shape.

This is not only legal tragedy.

It is generational harm.

Fathers are meant to protect children from danger — not guide them inadvertently into the storms of allegations, public humiliation, and imprisonment.

When leaders turn office into personal machinery, they do not fall alone. They drag spouses, children, relatives, and friends into the wreckage.

And many never emotionally recover.

Did No One Whisper, “Are We Not Going Too Far?”

I often wonder about silence inside powerful homes.

During those years of acquisitions and expansion, didno one quietly say:

“Sir… are we not going too far?”

“Father… this road is dangerous.”

He had wives. He had children. He had people who loved him.

Yet power does something subtle:

it rewards those who agree,

it isolates those who question,

and it slowly punishes voices of restraint.

So the whispers stop.

And then one day, the judge speaks instead.

If the Judiciary Is Afraid, Justice Will Never Breathe

Nigeria’s judiciary contains men and women of integrity — but it also operates inside real pressure:

political influence,

quiet threats,

career leverage,

and structural intimidation.

In such an environment, justice does not survive without courage.

If the judges in this process are not prepared to risk discomfort, influence, whispering pressure, and even personal cost, then justice may quietly rot from within.

Because corruption rarely arrives shouting.

It arrives politely — and persistently.

And this entire saga — morally speaking — simply stinks.

Not because of one accusation, but because of a pattern that insults the meaning of justice itself.

Malami Is One of Them — And That Is What Must Change

He is not alone.

He is not uniquely evil.

He is part of a political ecosystem that groomsentitlement, normalizes excess, rewards loyalty over conscience, and teaches leaders that law is something to manage rather than obey.

And now, that system is turning inward on itself.

This is not about revenge.

This is about reckoning.

Even If This Is a Witch-Hunt — The Moral Crisis Remains

Let us grant — for argument — that politics plays a role.

Still, one truth refuses to disappear:

Nigeria has allowed power to drift too far from accountability.

That culture — not just one man — must be confronted. Otherwise, new names will rise, repeat the pattern, and drag us through this same heartbreak again.

If He Is Finally Found Guilty — Let It Not End With Chains

If after full legal process Malami is found guilty, punishment alone will not heal this nation.

Prison should not simply lock him away.

It should force transformation.

Let him teach law in prison.

Let him guide inmates who do not understand their rights.

Let him face — every day — the citizens who suffered the sharpest edges of the system he once controlled.

That is not mercy.

That is accountability joined with purpose.

Justice is not only retribution.

Justice is also correction.

The Court Above All Courts

Courts will issue judgments. History will issue memory. Conscience will issue truth.

And that higher court asks:

Did justice become protection for citizens —

or a shield for the powerful?

Until leadership understands that justice means fairness, safety, and dignity — not status and wealth — Nigeria will continue walking with silent grief.

A Closing Reflection — From a Psychologist Who Weeps for His Country

I do not deny that Malami accomplished some institutional work. I do not pretend he stands alone. I do not declare guilt before judgment.

But I mourn — deeply.

I mourn a nation repeatedly forced to watch guardians of justice drift dangerously close to the injustices they were meant to confront.

Even if this is a witch-hunt,

it is also a mirror.

And unless this mirror forces a national transformation of conscience — not just one conviction — we will remain trapped in cycles of betrayal.

Nigeria does not only need prosecutions.

Nigeria needs truth, humility, and a justice system worthy of its people.

Only then will this wounded nation begin to heal.

About the Author

Prof. John Egbeazien Oshodi is an American psychologist, an expert in policing and corrections, and an educator with expertise in forensic, legal, clinical, and cross-cultural psychology, including public ethical policy. A native of Uromi, Edo State, Nigeria, and son of a 37-year veteran of the Nigeria Police Force, he has long worked at the intersection of psychology, justice, and governance. In 2011, he helped introduce advanced forensic psychology to Nigeria through the National Universities Commission and Nasarawa State University, where he served as Associate Professor of Psychology.

He teaches in the Doctorate in Clinical and School Psychology at Nova Southeastern University; the Doctorate Clinical Psychology, BS Psychology, and BS Tempo Criminal Justice programs at Walden University; and lectures virtually in Management and Leadership Studies at Weldios University and ISCOM University. He is also the President and Chief Psychologist at the Oshodi Foundation, Center for Psychological and Forensic Services, United States.

Prof. Oshodi is a Black Republican in the United States but belongs to no political party in Nigeria—his work is guided solely by justice, good governance, democracy, and Africa’s development. He is the founder of Psychoafricalysis (PsychoafricalyticPsychology), a culturally grounded framework that integrates African sociocultural realities, historical awareness, and future-oriented identity. He has authored more than 500 articles, multiple books, and numerous peer-reviewed works on Africentricpsychology, higher education reform, forensic and correctional psychology, African democracy, and decolonized models of clinical and community engagement.