The Chief Judge of the High Court of the Federal Capital Territory, Hon. Justice Hussein Baba-Yusuf, has decried the negative impact of false information in the administration of justice during the opening ceremony of the 2023/2024 Legal Year.
According to him, ” the rights of other persons are often breached with recklessness, misinformation, disinformation, fake news, cyberbullying, online harassment, etc, which have become the order of the day.
” The alarming rates at which unverified allegations and malicious attacks on or against innocent persons are recklessly posted and spread around on social media denotes how so low civility has declined in our society at large.
The Chief Judge warned that when important institutions like the judiciary are maligned with fake and unsubstantiated news and opinions, the entire society will be affected.
Recently, many Nigerians have taken to social media spaces to criticize the Nigerian Judiciary for what they perceive as inconsistent judgments that are thought to be influenced by corruption and other primordial interests. The criticisms against the judiciary have notably been on the increase following the judgments of the Court of Appeal and the Supreme Court on the petitions filed by Atiku Abubakar of the Peoples Democratic Party and Peter Obi of the Labour Party, which challenged the validity of the election of President Tinubu.
