By Adebisi Onanuga
The Nigerian judiciary must transit to a modern justice delivery institution and shake off its reputation of being stuck in the limitations of a bygone era, a rights group, Access to Justice (A2J), has said.
According to it, the judicial system had been inert in the wake of the coronavirus pandemic and its failure to adopt modern technology had exacted a heavy toll on its capacity for 21st justice delivery.
A2J urged the Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Ibrahim Muhammad, and the National Judicial Council (NJC) to direct heads of court to make provisions and directions enabling the use of electronic tools for trial of cases where possible, particularly appellate cases.
It also urged that they ensure the continuity of court business where possible in the coming weeks, especially for cases involving fundamental rights and the liberty of citizens, cases touching on issues related to the COVID-19 pandemic, and other time-sensitive cases.
In a statement issued in Lagos titled: “COVID-19 Pandemic: A Wake-Up Call” and signed by the convener of the group, Joseph Otteh, and Project Director Deji Ajare, the group emphasised the need for the judiciary to wake-up and re-invent itself.
“The judiciary must reflect on the lessons of this pandemic in a constructive way, and must not be caught napping like this again if another outbreak similar to this one, per chance, comes upon the world.
“After this pandemic eases and normal business resumes, the Nigerian Judiciary must not return to business as normal or remain the same. The Judiciary’s “normal” has consistently been a very poor template, unable to meet the needs and yearnings of Nigerians for efficiency, accessibility, and integrity”, it stressed.
The group suggested a time-scaled programme of re-organising the way states and federal courts will henceforth conduct business commencing immediately after the period of the pandemic,, while mandating federal and state courts to develop sustainable policies and programmes for leveraging information technology systems – such as electronic filings, tracking, communication and notifications, certifications, case management, record keeping and video conferencing – in the way courts function going forward.
A2J also urged the CJN to consider a substantial reduction of the annual vacation period of Courts for the 2019/2020 legal year arguing that this will be a fair way for the judiciary to show that it is invested in seeing that justice is delivered to litigants on time.
It also urged the Attorney-General of the Federation, Federal and State governments, alongside National and State legislatures to support any reforms that the judiciary embarks upon in the use of technology for delivering justice by appropriating adequate funds for this purpose, and ensuring that those funds are put to effective and prudent use.
A2J acknowledged all steps announced by the CJN on March 23, to check the spread of the coronavirus disease which included suspension of court sittings and proceedings with considerations made for urgent, essential and time-bound matters in all courts, noting that since that time, most court operations across the country have been shuttered.
It however, noted that some courts, such as the Court of Appeal, in the light of the current situation, introduced modest information technology (IT) tools to the adjudication process, requiring that electronic channels of communication be now used to communicate with the court, which according to the Acting President of the Court, reduces the amount of talking and time expended over a matter in court while most courts which have not instated similar measures have simply shut down.
It said technology made many courts to continue to attend to the thousands of cases in their dockets, not defer them to a later time, adding that this was what happened in many countries, including developing countries, like India that embraced information technology in its court systems since the 1970s and in a number of other developing countries like Malaysia, Kenya, South Africa and Brazil.
“In fact, in 2019, South Africa began the use of software to create and implement digital courtrooms retrofitted with multi-media and video conferencing tools. Communication technologies are so widely and inexpensively available at this time that there is no meaningful excuse not to exploit their use to keep some courts and proceedings running even during a pandemic,” it noted.
A2J regretted that COVID-19, its associated effects, including the suspension of judicial proceedings, exposed the many faults in Nigeria’s judiciary.
It also berated successive generations of judicial leaderships’ failure to re-organise how justice delivery processes are ordered so as to make them more efficient, timely and effective by leveraging on the tools offered by modern information technology for this purpose.
‘The Judiciary itself, has, for a long period, bemoaned the increasing workload of the courts, and the stress it places on the justice system and Judges, but has not done much in the way of mitigation by the introduction of technologies that can help it cope with the pressure on its dockets and the use of its limited time and resources. The failure of the Judiciary to turn to modern technology has considerably impaired the delivery of justice in Nigeria.
“Rather the judiciary has adamantly carried on with labourious, inefficient manual processes that promote inefficiency, increase costs and create extreme inconveniences for both itself and those who depend on its services.
In exceptional instances when courts have introduced some form of technology – such as electronic recording machines – this has either been short-lived or have practically returned no significant value since Judges still rely on manual recording of court proceedings in those courts and hearings are not sped up,” the group stated.
A2J, while acknowledging that a pandemic-induced lockdown will have notable effect on the delivery of justice, contended that there was no reason why it should bring nearly the entire judicial system to a halt.
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