The Presidency on Sunday night maintained that the arrest of some justices and judges across the country by the Department of State Security (DSS) was an attack on corruption and not on judiciary.
DSS at the weekend had recovered N93.5 million, $530,087 and £25,970 from three of the justices and judges in its custody.
There was public outrage against the method adopted by the DSS as many viewed the move as anti-democracy.
But the Senior Special Assistant to the President on Media and Publicity, Garba Shehu, in a statement, said that the President reserves his highest respect for the institution of the judiciary as the third arm of government.
To this end, he said that the President will not do anything to undermine the judiciary’s independence.
According to him, President Buhari remained a committed democrat in words and in actions and will not take any action in violation of the constitution.
The statement reads in parts: “The recent surgical operation against some judicial officers is specifically targeted at corruption and not at the judiciary as an institution.
“In a robust democracy such as ours, there is bound to be a plurality of opinions on any given issue, but there is a convergence of views that the country has a corruption problem that needs to be corrected.
“But reports by a section of the media are giving us cause for concern.
“In undertaking the task of reporting, the media should be careful about the fault lines they open. It is wrong to present this incident as a confrontation between the executive and judicial arms of government.”
He said that the Presidency has received assurances from the DSS that all due processes of the law, including the possession of search and arrest warrants were obtained before the searches.
To suggest that the government is acting outside the law in a dictatorial manner, he said, is to breach the interest of the state.
