As part of the implementation of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015, FCT Magistrates on Wednesday partnered with the FCT Police Command to decongest police cell.
Chief Magistrate Josephine Ogbaeide, the Director of FCT Magistrate led 25 magistrates to inspect the Police detention facilities at the Special Anti Robbery Squad (SARS), Abuja.
The move was against the backdrop of collaboration between Rule of Law and Anti Corruption (RoLAC), programme funded by the EU and managed by the British Council.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that alleged offenders such as arm robbers, kidnappers, rapists, car thieves, one chance, cultism, terrorists were kept in the SARS cell.
Ogbaeide said that the magistrates’ concern was to make the society a better place, adding that the police and the magistrates were in partnership for a better country and the FCT.
She said that some of the alleged criminals kept at the police cell were innocent of the offences, adding that there was no basis for keeping them beyond the required 48 hours without charging them to court.
“The people kept in the cell are our brothers and sisters, they are not from South Africa; it is expedient for us to charge them to court immediately.’’
She said that the magistrate deemed it fit to inspect the police cell to see how it could be decongested , adding that they also needed to ensure some of the cases were within their jurisdiction.
Mr Abdulyari Lafia, the FCT Deputy Commissioner of Police in charge of investigation said that the police were in partnership with the ACJA.
He said that the police had nothing to hide contrary to belief that the police often concealed issues to keep alleged criminals in their cells
Lafia said that he deemed it necessary to come in person to welcome the magistrates and lay bare some of the challenges they were confronted with.
“You need to assist us to make our job easier, ACJA is not an easy thing on the part of police but with the support of magistrates, our job will be made easy,” he said.
Mr Peter Omenka, the Programme Officer, Justice Department of RoLAC said the ACJ Monitoring Committee would be supporting the judiciary and the police to implement the provision of sections 33 and 34 of the Act.
According to him, so far, the magistrates have been visiting all the police stations in FCT every month to know the condition of detainees in police cells.
He called on the magistrates to assist the police to make their job easy.
NAN reports that this is the first time they will be visiting SARS which is a further step in providing judicial oversight in the Nigerian Judicial system.
The visitation was made possible through the collaboration between RoLAC, the ACJA and magistrates in the FCT and the Nigeria Police.
