Some Lagos-based lawyers have called for a better system of justice in the country with a special focus on the police, judges and the people.
The legal practitioners, who spoke with the newsmen on Tuesday, argued that the current justice system was no longer sustainable.
They attributed the poor justice administration in the country to the neglect of certain factors such as the police, the judges and the populace by the system.
Mr Olawale Fapohunda, a human rights activist and former Secretary, Committee on the Reform of the Judiciary, said government must support the police, the prisons, magistrates and judges.
“The state of the Criminal Justice System in Nigeria is not sustainable, it starts with the police. The law establishing the police (the police act) was inherited from the colonial era, so it is not relevant presently in Nigeria.
“The consequences of that is the number of cases of police brutality, cases of extra judicial killings because there is no accountable system; there is no law that makes the police accountable now.
“When you talk about prison too, we have the prison act 1972. That also is not relevant to the current realities of the Nigerian prison system. Apart from that, we have an issue with the population in the prisons.
?“We have about 60,000 prison population, but with 36,000 awaiting trial inmates many of who have spent from 10 years and above, awaiting trial.”
He expressed dismay that magistrates were not treated properly, a situation which he said had led to the call for government to privatise the criminal justice system.
?Fapohunda also blamed the escalation of terrorism in the country on the failure of the justice system and urged government to support and fund the institutions affiliated to the justice system to enable them perform.
Also commenting, Mr Spurgeon Ataene, a lawyer, said there was the need to build a formidable leadership framework if justice administration was to succeed.
According to him, it is important that the police force is well-equipped to tackle the security challenges in the country more effectively.
He said the conditions of service of police officers should be reviewed with the aim of encouraging them to be more dedicated top their job of safeguarding the lives and property of Nigerians.
“If remuneration is increased to the extent that an average police officer who is educated enough – at least at the level of OND before he will be allowed to come into the police force – has all the gadgets that a police officer needs to perform, has a remuneration which is at least above average; let me propose at least a hundred thousand for the said police officer.
“If that happens, it will be very difficult for anybody to be swayed by the monetary incentive that comes from the different criminal suspects in respect of any offence at all.”
Ataene said incentive to the police should not be the exclusive of the top officers alone but should be extended to junior officers too.
However, Mr Ogedi Ogu, a lawyer with the Source Chambers, Lagos, said if the National Assembly has people who are conversant with law, appropriate laws would be enacted that would aid the dispensation of justice.
He noted that if laws were made to suit the judicial system, the judges will follow these laws and thus promote smooth administration.
He also said there was need for the chambers of the judges and magistrates to be equipped with updated libraries of recent laws and development.
According to him, judges should be made to go on regular training workshop to keep them abreast with justice administration.
“Lawyer don’t make laws it has to do with the legislators, so we take it from the angle of the legislature. Qualified personnel will have to be at the legislative house to make appropriate laws that will suit the Nigerian context.
“When they make good laws that is the only time you will now see an efficient judiciary if they make bad law the judiciary will follow suit.”
?
?
