Picture the scene.
A man in a balaclava storms into a bank. He waves a firearm. Tellers tremble. Customers hit the floor. The CCTV camera does what CCTV cameras do best, record history in 480p.
He walks out with bags of cash.
But here is the twist: he does not buy a yacht. He does not flee to the Cayman Islands. He does not invest in crypto named after a dog.
He pays for his parents’ funeral.
His parents, we are told, were veterans of the Iraq war. Wounded. Decorated. Patriotic. They had their life savings stolen years earlier. Bureaucracy failed them. The system shrugged. And now they are dead.
Our robber, clearly having watched too many superhero films, decides that if the state cannot provide dignity, he will. With interest. At gunpoint.
The funeral is magnificent. Flags. Brass band. Full honours. A horse-drawn carriage. The sort of ceremony normally reserved for people whose names get buildings.
The money, of course, is not his.
The Courtroom Drama
He is caught, because armed robbery is not, contrary to Netflix’s suggestions, a sustainable career path.
The defence stands up in court.
“My Lord,” counsel begins solemnly, “the funds were necessary for social good. And in any event… they are spent.”
There is a murmur in court.
The prosecution clears its throat: “He robbed a bank.”
“Yes,” says the defence, “but a good robbery.”
This is the jurisprudential equivalent of arguing that arson is acceptable if the house was ugly.
The legal issue appears straightforward. Armed robbery is unlawful. The motive may mitigate sentence. It does not transform theft into philanthropy.
You establish the wrong. Consequences follow. That is how law works. Cause. Effect. Wrong. Remedy.
Or so we thought.
Enter Justice Administrative Headache
Now imagine, through some tear in the constitutional fabric, a cameo from Brett M. Kavanaugh.
In a separate but thematically relevant universe, the great tariff escapade of the Supreme Court of the United States, the issue was not whether executive power had been stretched like airport pizza dough.
No, the concern, at least rhetorically, drifted toward the administrative nightmare of undoing tariffs already collected.
Refunds? Recalculations? Forms? Clerks with headaches?
Heaven forbid.
This is where our bank robber beams with hope.
Because in his case too, the money is gone. The brass band has been paid. The undertaker has retired comfortably. The sandwiches have been eaten.
Administrative complexity looms.
Shall we claw back the floral arrangements? Invoice the widow who caught the bouquet? Reverse the bugler’s last post?
Imagine the judge leaning back:
“Well, yes, technically you committed armed robbery… but the refunds process would be frightfully inconvenient.”
We have now entered a legal universe where illegality is secondary to logistics.
The Upside-Down Principle
This is the inversion.
The first question in any court of law is not: “Will fixing this be annoying?”
It is: “Was this lawful?”
If not, the remedy follows, even if the remedy is messy, expensive, or politically embarrassing.
Otherwise, we are announcing a bold new doctrine:
If you can spend the proceeds quickly enough, you win.
Rob fast. Spend faster. Create paperwork chaos. Invoke administrative despair.
By that logic, every embezzler should immediately fund a community centre. Every fraudster should build a statue. Every corrupt official should commission a fireworks display.
“Your Honour, dismantling the fireworks would be disruptive.”
The Candy Shop Theory of Governance
There is something profoundly childish in the idea that power can be exercised first and justified later because reversing it is inconvenient.
It is the “kid in a candy shop” model of governance.
Take the sweets.
Eat the sweets.
Then argue that returning them would cause a sugar imbalance.
The constitutional structure, legislature makes the law, executive executes it, courts interpret it, is not decorative. It is load-bearing.
When the wrong is clear, the inconvenience of remedy is not a legal defence. It is merely a practical problem.
Courts are not meant to be event planners tidying up after power grabs.
They are meant to say:
This was lawful.
Or this was not.
Full stop.
Back to Our Robber
So what should our judge do?
Not ask how to un-eat the sandwiches.
Not wonder whether the band can refund the trumpet player’s overtime.
Not fret about the floral supply chain.
The judge should do something radical.
Apply the law.
The parents deserved dignity. That is tragic and compelling. But private grievance does not confer public authority to rob a bank.
Because the moment we say otherwise, we are no longer governed by law.
We are governed by outcomes.
And outcomes, like funerals and tariffs, always seem noble to the person who imposed them.
Until someone else decides their cause is even nobler.
And arrives at the bank with a bigger bag.
Centre for Nigeria Progress 