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Several Senior Advocates of Nigeria (SANs) and other justice sector stakeholders have urged the new Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Kudirat Kekere-Ekun, to make sanitation of the Judiciary a top priority.
The senior lawyers made the call yesterday in Abuja at a roundtable discussion on how to address the major issues undermining the institutional integrity, effectiveness and service delivery of the Judiciary.
The event was organized by Tap iNitaitive For Citizens Development and Network of University Legal Aid Institutions (NULAI), Nigeria.
Former Deputy Director of the Nigerian Law School, Prof. Ernest Ojukwu (SAN), Prof. Samuel Erugo (SAN), and a number of other senior lawyers, who made the call, stated that the Judiciary is currently suffering from low public confidence.
They said this anomaly requires immediate attention to restore system integrity.
The speakers urged Justice Kekere-Ekun to reform the judicial appointment process to eradicate nepotism and favoritism, which they said were rampant.
They also touched on the need for a new CJN to address challenges related to abuse of ex-parte orders, conflicting judgments by courts of the same jurisdiction and related issues.
Ojukwu, Erugo and others stressed the need to reform the process for handling election petitions and political cases and work to improve discipline and accountability in the system.
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Ojukwu advised the new CJN to always be guided by the principles of justice, fairness and justice.
He called for a process that would reduce the influence of the Judiciary in resolving election disputes so that political leaders would be the true choice of the voters, and not the courts.
Erugo called for the Supreme Court to be reformed so that it could review its own decisions, especially when there was public outcry.
However, Tap Initiative Executive Director Martin Obono noted that the National Judicial Council (NJC), which oversees judicial appointments, has recently drawn public criticism over allegations that the outgoing CJN, Justice Olukayode Ariwoola, influenced the appointment of some family members.
Obono asserted that the NJC had ignored its guidelines in its recent appointment of judges, adding: “There have been reports of violations of the existing rules governing the appointment of judges by insiders, such as the appointment of a candidate who scored zero in the NJC interview.”
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