By DADA AYOKHAI
The Civil Society Observatory Group has vowed to end unnecessary delay and bottleneck in the discharge of criminal administrative justice system to address illegal elongation of detention of suspects and to decongest prison facilities across the country.
Edo State Chairman of ACJL, Doctor Bright Oniovokukor stated this at a courtesy visit to leadership of Edo NUJ in Benin City.
Doctor Oniovokukor who explained that the body was birthed by Centre for Law Enforcement Education in Nigeria, CLEEN foundation, was saddled with the responsibility of promoting public safety, security and justice through empirical research, legislative advocacy, administrative programme and publication.
He noted that the group’s aim was among others to improve transparency, efficiency and accountability in the implementation of ACJL in Edo State and Nationally, stressing that the body was poised to strengthen criminal justice accountability infrastructure in Edo State through enhanced accountability and public engagement.
He explained that crime are committed by people and supposed to be checked by various laws that have been enacted in the society to avoid tortuous journey and bottlenecks in the administrative of criminal justice
The chairman of Nigeria Union of Journalists, Edo State Council, Comrade Festus Alenkhe thanked the body for doing a selfless work to check the criminal justice system and urged them to continue it good work.
The Edo NUJ boss also charged the body to partner ministry of justice to fast track the discharge of criminal administrative justice in the country to avoid elongation of cases and to decongest prison facilities across the country.
He advised the body to educate the public on the need for government to provide lawyers for the poor who can’t hire legal services to defend themselves because of their poor background.
Comrade Alenkhe said the group should visit prisons and inmates and call the attention of relevant authorities on the need to give them attention and give accelerated hearing to their cases to get objective service of criminal administrative justice system.
