High Bail Conditions Oppress Poor Defendants

Former Minister of Aviation, Osita Chidoka, has condemned what he described as excessive and unrealistic bail conditions imposed by Nigerian courts, warning that such requirements effectively deny defendants their constitutional right to bail and undermine the administration of justice.

In a statement titled “Bail and the Dignity of the Law: A Call for Judicial Restraint,” Chidoka criticised a recent ruling by a High Court in Abuja that granted bail to a defendant but attached conditions he said were virtually impossible for ordinary Nigerians to meet.

According to Chidoka, the court required the defendant to provide sureties who are serving federal civil servants on Grade Level 16 or above, each owning property in Abuja valued at no less than ₦500 million. In addition, one of the sureties was required to furnish a bank guarantee of ₦15 billion.

The former minister argued that the conditions are disconnected from the economic realities of public service in Nigeria.

He noted that a civil servant who begins at Grade Level 08 and rises to Grade Level 16 after nearly three decades of service would likely earn between ₦80 million and ₦100 million throughout an entire career.

“By the court’s ruling, we are asking that officer to show assets worth five times his lifetime earnings and stand behind a liability of ₦15 billion—roughly 150 times everything an honest career could ever yield,” Chidoka said.

He argued that such requirements send a troubling message that lawful public service is incapable of producing the level of wealth courts now expect from individuals deemed trustworthy enough to stand as sureties.

“What message does this send?” he asked. “It suggests that lawful public service cannot produce the wealth the court now expects of a respectable citizen, and that the civil servant worth trusting is the one who has somehow acquired assets his salary could never explain. In an anti-corruption case, of all places, that is a strange measure of integrity.”

Chidoka also criticised the requirement that sureties surrender their international passports, arguing that such a condition could prevent senior government officials from carrying out official duties that require international travel.

“Senior officers travel on the nation’s business for negotiations, conferences, and training. Stripping them of their passports merely to vouch for an accused person interferes with the very responsibilities the state employs them to perform,” he said.

Drawing comparisons with other jurisdictions, Chidoka said similar bail conditions would be considered disproportionate and unreasonable.

“To grasp the scale of it, imagine requiring a British public official to own property in Belgravia, Chelsea, or Mayfair before qualifying as a surety, while also producing a bank guarantee of £8.2 million. Such a proposition would immediately provoke questions about proportionality and public outrage,” he stated.

The former minister further argued that Nigerian law explicitly prohibits excessive bail conditions.

Citing Section 165 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA), he noted that bail conditions “shall not be excessive.” He also referenced the Court of Appeal’s decision in Dasuki v. Director-General, State Security Service (SSS), which rejected the use of serving public servants as sureties and struck down a ₦100 million bail requirement.

“The law has already spoken,” Chidoka said. “Section 165 of the ACJA commands that bail conditions shall not be excessive. In Dasuki v. D.G., SSS, the Court of Appeal held that using serving public servants as sureties was unknown to our law, contrary to Public Service Rules, and harmful to the fight against corruption. Yet we have answered that ruling with ₦500 million property requirements and a ₦15 billion guarantee.”

He maintained that courts cannot conclude that a defendant poses no significant flight risk while simultaneously imposing conditions that only individuals of extraordinary wealth can satisfy.

“A court that finds no real risk of flight cannot, in the same breath, impose conditions fit for a fugitive of vast and unexplained means. Conditions that cannot be met are not conditions; they are a denial of bail by arithmetic,” he said.

Chidoka stressed that the debate is not about the guilt or innocence of accused persons but about preserving the integrity and fairness of the legal process.

“The focus is the bail application, not the innocence or otherwise of the accused. The fight against corruption must be conducted within the bounds of the law, or it is not truly won at all. Courts should ensure attendance at trial—that is their duty—and stop there,” he stated.

He added that bail exists solely to guarantee a defendant’s appearance in court and should never be transformed into a mechanism for punishment before conviction.

“The purpose of bail is to secure appearance. It was never intended to measure a person’s wealth, punish them before guilt is established, or make honest public service appear inadequate,” he said.

Chidoka also called for an end to what he described as the judiciary’s fixation on civil servants as sureties and its reliance on elite Abuja districts such as Maitama and Asokoro as benchmarks for determining a surety’s worth.

“It is time to end this fixation with civil servants as sureties and with Maitama and Asokoro as the only measures of value before our courts. Such practices are discriminatory, humiliating to citizens who do not reside in court-approved elite neighbourhoods, and cast an unwarranted cloud of suspicion over public servants.

“On both counts, the law could not have intended the weaponisation of wealth over character,” he concluded.