Prosecutors, Registrars Banned From Extorting Money From Police, Litigants
CYRIACUS IZUEKWE
Sanity may gradually be returning to the Judiciary in Lagos State following the
recent proscription of illegal payments that goes directly to the purse of
judicial staff over the years in various Courts in the State.
P.M.EXPRESS reports that this followed the
recent public notice placed at the Ogba Magistrates Court and duly signed by
the Court administrator, Chief Magistrate, Mrs Y.O. Aje-Afunwa.
In the memo sighted by our correspondent dated 7th February, 2020, it stated
the caption: Report Of Extorting Before Bail Is Approved. It indicated that the
management had received complaints that complainants and defendants
representative were extorted before assigning overnight cases before the Court.
It further stated that henceforth, no registrar, Police IPO or prosecutor
should collect any money from the litigants in the name of assisting to assign
cases to Court. It warned that any officer caught flaunting the directive would
be dealt with according to the Judiciary rules.
P.M.EXPRESS confirmed that the directive has
started working at the Ogba Magistrates Court, Lagos, as such illegal
collection of money for files, bail approval money and other forms of extortion
have disappeared from the Court.
It was a sort of relief for Investigation Police Officers, who were made to pay
certain amount of money to the registrar for assigning cases to various Courts
and verification of addresses by prosecutors before bail was approved by
Magistrates.
Some of the Police officers, who spoke to P.M.EXPRESS correspondent on
condition of anonymity said that they were surprised when they gave registrars
their usual files money, they rejected and claimed that it was a directive from
the management. They commended the Judiciary for taking practical steps to stop
such sharp practices which they said had delayed the process of prosecution in
Lagos State.
However, they said that the prison management should take a cue from the
Judiciary; they revealed that prison warders were so corrupt and aggressively
extort from litigants by forcing the complainants to part with N3,000 per
defendant arraigned in Court and remanded in prison before they would accept
such defendant and take into the prison van.