A veteran Nigerian lawyer and politician is urging authorities to speed up trials
DAKAR (TrustLaw) – A veteran Nigerian lawyer and politician has urged the country’s authorities to set up special courts to try high-profile corruption cases in a bid to speed up the process, Nigerian newspapers reported on Thursday.
Edwin Clarke, who was speaking at a news conference in Abuja, said Nigeria’s anti-graft agencies have been doing their utmost to combat corruption by investigating and arraigning several personalities, but the cases have stagnated in courts. The suspects include senior government officials, former state governors and senators.
He said the same judges who handle cases of corruption also have to handle civil and election cases, so they postpone the corruption trials. The suspects end up on bail and continue their activities unhindered, leaving the public with the impression that authorities condone impunity.
“A situation where cases against high profile citizens, former governors and legislators have been in court for four years and above, and people no longer talk about them, is not acceptable,” PM News quoted Clarke as saying.
“It is strongly advised that Your Lordship (Chief Justice of Nigeria) and the National Judicial Council (NJC) should assign or appoint some judges whose duties are to handle only corruption cases,” the Nigerian Tribune quoted Clarke as saying.
Nigeria has often been rated among the world’s most corrupt nations in international governance and transparency indexes.
In the past decade, Nigerian authorities have passed legislation and created anti-graft agencies such as the Economic and Financial Crimes Commission (EFCC) and the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC).
The agencies have in the past six years made a series of arrests and initiated court cases but most of the cases involving top officials and personalities have stalled.
According to local media reports, the agencies have blamed the courts for the delays saying their mandate is prevention, investigation, and arraignment and it is left to the courts to judge the suspects. The courts say the delays are due to the workload on other civil and criminal issues. They also say that the agencies are not sufficiently thorough in their preliminary investigations.
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