The Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee (ACJMC) has made a formal presentation of framed posters in support of criminal justice institutions in Nigeria to the Independent Corrupt Practices and Other Related Offences Commission (ICPC) recently in Abuja.
The posters which have pictures and messages depicting various themes and elements of the Nigerian criminal justice administration were designed to create awareness on the obligations of law enforcement agencies in the administration of criminal justice in Nigeria and aid effective dissemination of information.
Speaking during the presentation, the Special Assistant to the President on Prosecution, Chief Okoi Obono-Obla, said the Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015 (ACJ Act) was one of the measures put in place by the Federal Government of Nigeria to modernize and reform the criminal justice system. He explained that if the provisions of the Act were properly applied and implemented by stakeholders in the criminal justice sector, it would go a long way in ensuring criminal cases were speedily and expeditiously heard and determined by the courts.
In his remarks after receiving the materials, the ICPC Chairman, Mr. Ekpo Nta, said the Commission was already doing a lot in ensuring that the rights of suspects in ICPC custody were protected. This, he said, the agency does by putting suspects through medical checks when brought into its custody. He recommended to ACJMC that medical checks be included for all suspects as this would go a long way in preventing deaths in detention facilities.
Mr. Nta advised the Committee to partner with relevant government agencies to infuse some of the outcomes of their work into the curriculum of law faculties and social studies in the nation’s various institutions respectively.
He added that the world had gone global, hence, any information should be available at the click of a finger. “For corruption eradication to work, we need to look into the system and invest in making it work, with arresting agencies going electronic,” Mr. Nta said.
He advised that all heads of organisations with detention facilities be kept abreast with the status of suspects in custody no matter where they were.
The Chairman also praised the Committee for bringing to public attention things that had been kept away from them, especially in regard to the obligations of the authorities that hold arrested persons in custody.