Nigeria, Feb. 23 -- For nearly five years, Abia State has been the site of a bewildering contest over the crisis of corruption that now bedevils Nigeria's judicial appointment process. Essentially, the appointment of judges in Nigeria has become something akin to a life-and-death contest, not for or on behalf of those seeking to get justice from the courts but for people who see judicial appointment as a meal-ticket for life or as leverage in the dark arts of Nigeria's rentier theatre.

Those who control the process now seem very much to use it only to benefit their families and networks; those on the outside of this circle feel entitled to the good life that they believe judges now seem to get. The contest between these two camps is incr...