DELAY IN TRIALS: People must know which arm of govt is responsible –CJN

The Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Walter Onnoghen, on Tuesday explained the reason he set up special courts meant to quicken trials of corruption cases.

The CJN said that it was necessary to set up the special court so that people will know who exactly is responsible for delays in court trials.

“All along, everybody is passing buck. The prosecution will say it is not our responsibility, we are not the cause of the delay. The investigator will say l am not the cause, the Judge will say, l am not the cause. So, the people must know who is the cause of the delay.

“That is why l set up that committee made up of the defence counsel, the prosecutor and the Judiciary under the NJC,” Onnoghen said, adding that it was wrong to heap the blame of the delay in dispensation of justice on judges alone.

The CJN made this known when he spoke with correspondents after a closed door meeting with President Muhammadu Buhari at the Presidential Villa, Abuja.

According to him, the judiciary has been waiting on the executive arm of government to establish the special courts that will try corruption cases, since it was not the the responsibility of the judiciary.

He said, “It is the executive in conjunction with the legislature that has the prerogatives of setting up courts, including the special courts, under our Constitution and not the judiciary.

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“Once the executive sets up such courts, the Judiciary will run on it by providing the manpower.”

Onnoghen refuted the claims by some Nigerians that the judiciary has not been on the same page with the executive on the fight against corruption.

“We are on the same page with the Executive. There are three arms of government and these three arms constitute the government. The government is not only the Executive,” he said.

On his rating of judges’ performance, he said he would give them a pass mark “under the circumstances,” they found themselves.

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