About four years after it was inaugurated, the Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee has covered a lot of milestones. Commissioner for Justice and Attorney General, AISHA DIKKO, who is a member of the committee, gives an insight into the policy. Abdallah Yunus Abdallah reports

The Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee was inaugurated in December 2018. How has the journey been so far?

The Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee was provided for by Section 466 of the Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Law 2017 and the committee was inaugurated in December 2018. The committee is saddled with the responsibility of ensuring the effective and efficient implementation of all the provisions of the law and it became my responsibility to contribute to ensuring to the successful actualization of the mandates of the committee.

Section 466 provides for membership of the committee which comprises almost all the stakeholders in the criminal justice sector and Section 467 stipulates their functions and empowers them to make regulations or create activities for effective and efficient criminal justice delivery.

Since I became the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, we have implemented the provision of Section 282 of the law which is the Plea Bargain, which was previously not being implemented. We are trying to implement the Bondsman Scheme and other schemes which are not contained in the law but which the committee feels will improve administration of criminal justice delivery in the state. Programmes like the District Prosecutors Scheme among others, which we found out to be working and assisting in justice delivery in other states, are being implemented.

Also, the committee in 2019, implemented the provision of Section 52 of the law which provides for the unscheduled visits to detention centres by Magistrates and Judges of Sharia and Customary Courts, to inspect whether detainees are lawfully remanded. So, this is done randomly and monthly reports are submitted to the committee.

You said that plea bargain is aimed at speeding up criminal proceedings. What checks have you put in place to guard against abuse and the subversion of justice?

Like I said, we have started implementing plea bargain in Kaduna State and in the last report that we presented, about 10 cases have been settled through plea bargain. Of course, we didn’t just wake up and start plea bargain in Kaduna State. First of all, we approached the Rule of Law and Anti-Corruption Programme (ROLAC), which is a European Union-funded programme and the officials assisted in training State Counsel in the Ministry of Justice, including police officers, members of the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA) and other stakeholders in the administration of criminal justice.

After that, we produced the Plea Bargain Manual, which provides steps that have to be followed to actualize the plea bargain procedure. There are guidelines on how to apply for a plea bargain, what to consider and how to negotiate between the defence counsel and the prosecutor. And these steps have checks and balances.

All requests have to go through the Plea Bargain Committee, which is chaired by the Solicitor General and Permanent Secretary of the Ministry of Justice and the final approval is given by the Hon. Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, before it goes to court for judgement.

Members of the judiciary were also trained by ROLAC and they came up with Sentencing Manual for the Plea Bargain, so that we have uniformed sentencing of offenders. What plea bargain is, is not what many Nigerians think.

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Yes, what most Nigerians hear is that someone is convicted of stealing N100 million for example but through plea bargain, he is given an option of fine and he pays something like N2 million and he is left off the hook. How does plea bargain really work, especially the Kaduna State model?

Like I said earlier, we have a manual that has to be followed and there are checks and balances. Plea bargain is basically about negotiation. It is not only about money because that is what Nigerians think. For example, if someone is charged with the offence of armed robbery which is punishable with death, however, during the act, if no life was taken or injury caused to anyone, a plea bargain agreement can be reached to reduce the offence to robbery which carries certain years imprisonment. Another example is, if a person is charged with assault, the Penal Code particularly, Section 240(a) provides for the punishment to be one-year imprisonment or fine of not less than N10,000 or both. The defendant can plead guilty to the offence and agree to pay the fine. So, this is what plea bargain really is, it is not just about money.

Like you mentioned earlier, one of the mandates of the Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee is paying unannounced visits to detention centres. Have Magistrates, Judges and Alkalis been doing this? If so, what has been the outcome?

We started the implementation of Section 52 of the law which is, visits to detention centres in 2019 and the exercise is ongoing. During those visits, the Judges have the powers to grant bail, if the detainees’ bail applications are taking too long or there is some sort of delay, the judges can grant them bail there and then and where the Judge does not have the power and the detainee has exceeded the time required by law, he immediately orders the detaining agency to take the detainee to the appropriate court.

For the 1^st quarter of this year, the reports of the visits were presented at the committee’s meeting and same deliberated upon. It was discovered at the meeting for the 1^st quarter, that the Judges visited 12 detention centres and there were 157 detainees in those centres. Fifty-seven detainees were granted bail and 20 were sent to the police for further investigations and 80 were ordered to be taken to court. There were no releases. So, it means that they didn’t find anyone that was illegally detained.

Sometimes, security forces like the military and Department of State Services (DSS) don’t like people having access to their detention centres. Did the judges encounter such resistance in the course of the visits?

Yes, at the beginning when we started, we encountered resistance from the military and the DSS, however, after some consultations and with one of their personnel being a member of the statutory committee, the DSS allowed us to visit their detention centres. We have visited a couple of times but the military hasn’t agreed yet.

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Are there any further engagements with the military, towards allowing the judges access to their detention centres?

The immediate past Chief Judge was in touch with them and they seem amenable. So, we will continue our engagement with them and hopefully, we will come to an agreement. But we are making progress, that is the important thing.

In lay terms, what is this Bondsman Scheme that you talked about?

The Bondsman Scheme is a scheme wherein a licenced corporate body will stand as surety(ies) to a defendant who has been granted bail by the court and this is covered in Section 200 of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law and it made provisions for the Chief Judge to license corporate organisations to act as bondsmen but they will be in the premises of the court. They are sureties for bail. So, they will shoulder all the burden for the bail applicant. They will register them, take their biometrics. So, whenever the defendant jumps bail, it is the bondsman that will be held liable. This will help to check the high incidence of people jumping bail. It will also reduce the burden on the court as well.

After about four years, how will you rank Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Committee as a member?

The committee has been doing well…. (laughter), even if we say so ourselves. Like I said, we are trying to implement the law to the letter. And all these things that we have introduced, is towards improving the administration of criminal justice in the state. Like the District Prosecutors Scheme that we want to introduce, we have already gone far, we have done training, and it will reduce the burden and clogging of cases in the court. The main aim of the District Prosecutors Scheme is to vet First Information Report (FIR) when they are raised by the police to ascertain if there is a prima facie case before they are presented to the court.

You know that in the lower courts, it is not only the Ministry of Justice that prosecutes, the police also prosecute and we know that there have been abuses. A lot of civil cases are being turned to criminal cases. So, the District Prosecutors Scheme is to reduce the incidences of frivolous filing of cases that don’t need to be in court. This will reduce the burden on the Magistrates.

So, when this FIR is filed, the District Prosecutor who is stationed within the court premises vets it to determine whether it is really a criminal case which can go before the Magistrate or not. If they think that mediation will be better, we have a mediation department that they can refer it to. If it is a case that can be solved even without going to mediation and where no prima facie case is established, he can discharge by virtue of Section 125 (6) (e) of the Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Law, 2017. And if they think it is a case that should be taken over, then the Ministry of Justice takes over and we prosecute the case.

 

LAW Facts

-The Kaduna State Administration of Criminal Justice Law was enacted to promote efficient and effective management of criminal justice institutions and speedy dispensation of justice;

-The Administration of Criminal Justice Law Monitoring Committee was inaugurated in December 2018;

-The Monitoring Committee, in collaboration with the ministry and in consultation with the judiciary, has instituted a Plea Bargain committee to conclude criminal proceedings on time with all parties–the state, the victim and the defendant—coming to a consensus;

-The committee and the ministry have fashioned out a Sentencing Manual to aid the court in deciding appropriate sentences after Plea Bargain has been concluded.

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