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| Justice on Wheels Bus |
A whooping 33, 692 inmates in Nigerian prisons are said to
be awaiting trial out of a total of 48,124 (Source: Daily Independent).
Several attempts have been made by civil society and other non-governmental
organisations to draw attention to this anomaly with very minimal success.
I was just watching France24 earlier today and saw a story
about 'Justice on Wheels' in Thailand. It is a programme in which a bus is designed
as a court with a judge and moves from Prison to Prison attending to the cases
of 'awaiting trial' inmates.
For information on this concept, read this:
[b]‘Justice on wheels’ disposes 67 cases [/b]
WITH DISPATCH. Supreme Court Deputy Administrator Nimfa
Cuesta Vilches, along with Naga City Mayor John Bongat witness the disposition
of cases inside the Justice on Wheels’ bus that held court at the Naga City
Hall Compound.
A total of 67 cases were disposed of recently by local
courts inside a mobile court, actually a bus, sent by the Supreme Court in this
city last July 22, Friday.
The project, “The Justice on Wheels and the Increasing
Access to Justice by the Poor,” is a part of the Supreme Court’s campaign for a
speedy and fair disposition of justice made accessible to concerned parties
within the marginalized sector, Executive Judge Jaime Contreras of RTC Branch
25.
Contreras added that it was the first time that the court on
wheels came to the City of Naga to provide deliberation on civil and criminal
cases involving inmates and detainees in the local Bureau of Jail Management
and Penology (BJMP), disposing as many as 67 cases during its one-day stay at
the Naga City People’s Hall in the City Hall Compound.
He explained that the cases brought there were already
sorted and read prior to the arrival of the Justice on Wheels and were only
waiting for formal disposition from local judges.
The bus, which was made to resemble an ordinary courtroom,
allowed the accused and the complainant to hear the decision of their case in
less than fifteen minutes in the presence of Deputy Court Administrator and
member of the Committee on Justice on Wheels of the Supreme Court, Justice
Nimfa Cuesta Vilches.
Contreras confirmed that the presence of the mobile court,
dubbed as justice on wheels, is one of the ways through which the Supreme Court
can improve our justice system and make it more accessible to the poor.
Contreras, however, was quick to point out that the justice
system and disposition of cases within Camarines Sur and the City of Naga are
not a problem as far as the local courts here are concerned.
He stressed that there is no backlog of cases here as
compared to other provinces where a criminal charge against one person could go
on for as long as 10 years without seeing the dawn of justice.
“Our lawyers and judges here know the value of speedy
disposition of cases to the common man,” Contreras said. “As you can see, our
lawyers are highly supportive and even voluntary in their participation with
this program. This is proof of how much we value justice.”
Now: Can we get a 100 buses like these in Nigeria
over the next 3 years? 40 could be
purchased in the first year, 30 in the second and third. With the use of computers
and internet these cases can be attended to with dispatch and records of
proceedings saved and backed-up without the need for keeping paper files as
records which create delays, aid inefficiency and encourage corruption. It will
also reduce the cost of running prisons as there will be fewer prisoners and
those convicted will serve their prison terms in more humane conditions that
can better facilitate their reformation and integration into society.
In addition, it will create jobs for lawyers, civil servants,
ICT professionals and other people. It is a very do-able and worthwhile project
to undertake. Yes, we have problems in Nigeria but with a little thinking,
dedication and willingness to make things work; they can be solved or at least
mitigated.
Is someone out there reading this and willing to take
action?
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