Unbundling courts in Nigeria

The delay in justice dispensation in Nigeria has been a cog in the wheel of justice for a long time now, and this has led to the high loss of confidence in the judiciary by the common man on the street. Without mincing words, the justice system in Nigeria is so slow that creditors often […]

The delay in justice dispensation in Nigeria has been a cog in the wheel of justice for a long time now, and this has led to the high loss of confidence in the judiciary by the common man on the street. Without mincing words, the justice system in Nigeria is so slow that creditors often resort to the use of police officers to recover debt from debtors as a faster means than approaching the court.

This has one way or the other driven or discouraged foreign investors from coming to invest in our beloved country, for fear of the challenges and delay in accessing justice. Some legal experts have argued that the delay in justice dispensation is mostly caused by frivolous applications filed by legal professionals, and this obstructs the smooth flow of proceedings in Nigerian courts, some have also stated that the many cases a judge handles might also contribute to the reason for the delay.

While this may be true, I strongly feel that it is the way our legal system is structured that is the major cause for delayed trials, and the best way out is to change the system by unbundling the jurisdictions of the court. It is my humble opinion that similar jurisdictions can be merged, and special courts created for special cases.

Take for instance, a Magistrate Court in Kaduna State has jurisdiction to handle criminal, civil and recovery of premises matters. Then we have Customary Courts handling certain civil customary matters, while Shariah Courts handle issues relating to Islamic Law. A closer look at these courts and the jurisdictional powers would show some overlapping duties of courts, and an overburdened magistrate.

Unbundling these courts will go a long way to free up the judicial system. A District Court jurisdiction can be restricted to civil matters and recovery of premises, while the Magistrate Courts handle only criminal trials. For superior courts of record, just like the National Industrial Court, Investment Security Tribunal, and the likes, the High Courts can be unbundled to handle specific cases, like having a Family Court that would strictly be responsible to handle matrimonial causes, a corruption court for anti – corruption matters, and constitutional courts for matters arising from the provisions of the constitution of the Federal Republic of Nigeria.

According to Nicholas Cletus Oche, Esq a legal professional in Kaduna, “Unbundling of courts can be done in several ways, namely territorial and subject matter jurisdiction, but emphasis should be on subject matter. Courts in Nigeria are mainly saddled to adjudicate on criminal and civil matters from the high court to the lower courts. Lower courts like Magistrate, District/Area, Shariah, and Customary Courts are vested with both criminal and civil jurisdiction. The state can do well in unbundling the jurisdictional subject matter in refocusing the court to function according to what the courts are established to achieve. Magistrate Courts should handle only criminal cases within its jurisdictional limit, while District Court should as a matter of urgency be separated from Magistrate Courts, and should handle matters that are purely civil in nature within its jurisdictional limit. In addition, there should be creation of special courts for special cases, this to my mind will aid in speedy dispensation of justice, as justice delayed is analogous to justice denied”

One day I was in court and the cause list of the magistrate had 22 cases slated for that day, the workload is too much on the members of the bench called to serve. If a judge or magistrate handles 15 to 20 cases every day, how then do we expect them to deliver justice in good time considering the fact that they have to personally write down every proceeding of every case in long hand for the number of cases listed on the cause list?

If courts are unbundled to specification, then it creates an avenue to free up the dockets of our umpires, thereby giving more time and space to dedicate to the few cases before them, and matters can be determined in good time. But if the structure of the legal system is left unchanged, then our judiciary would only be going in circles in justice dispensation instead of going forward.

“We cannot continue to do the same thing over and over again, and expect a different result”, hence, the onus is on us as nation to fashion out modalities to ease access to justice, so our judiciary can truly be the last hope of the common man.

Godspeed!

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