Legal experts argue that an effective criminal justice system is central to the sustenance of law and order in the society.
A criminal justice system is a set of legal and social institutions established for enforcing the criminal law, in accordance with a defined set of procedural rules and limitations.
The importance of a criminal justice system notwithstanding, observers note that criminal trials are often delayed, particularly where the defendants are able to hire lawyers who could exploit the weaknesses in the system.
In the light of such observations, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC) organised a workshop in Osogbo recently for stakeholders in the legal profession.
The workshop was designed to expose the participants to pragmatic ways of developing a strategic approach to ensure effective justice delivery system in Osun State.
Organised in conjunction with the European Union (EU), the workshop deliberated on the necessary means of enhancing good governance, respect for human rights and the rule of law.
The workshop, which has “An Action Plan For Justice Sector Reform in Osun’’ as its theme, examined methods of effective coordination and cooperation among justice sector institutions within an enhanced legal and policy framework.
Mr Edwin Berry, the Deputy Coordinator of UNDOC, said that UNDOC was the UN agency entrusted with the mandate to assist member states in their efforts to tackle corruption, illicit drugs, crime and terrorism.
He said that UNDOC was also providing technical assistance in the area of justice sector reform globally, adding that it had built up a knowledge base of successful practices.
He said that Osun was important in the area of judicial reform, having set a remarkable example as being the only state in Nigeria that already had a reform plan developed by the government.
Berry said that the workshop would as well strengthen capabilities and operational structures in the justice sector to increase access to justice and respect for human rights and the rule of law.
“Given this experience, the EU and the government of Nigeria have entrusted UNDOC with the responsibility of implementing a justice sector support programme and a campaign against drugs, organised crime and anti-corruption.
“The justice sector support programme is being implemented at the federal level and in some pilot states such as Rivers, Imo, Osun, Katsina, Lagos and the FCT,’’ he said.
Expressing the support of the state government for the programme, Mr Wale Afolabi, the Attorney-General and Commissioner for Justice in Osun, said that the government was passionate about reforming the criminal justice system in the state.
He pledged that government would ensure speedy acceleration of justice, while improving the welfare of judges and magistrates in the state.
Afolabi said that the state government would construct two new prisons as part of efforts to enhance access to justice, adding that the government recently employed 19 magistrates to facilitate speedy dispensation of justice.
According to him, the prisons will be located in Osogbo and Iwo Local Government Areas to decongest the two main prisons in Ilesa and Ile-Ife, which were established over 30 years ago.
“By the time these prisons are ready; they will decongest the main prisons, make transportation of suspects to the court faster and easier, while improving on our criminal justice system. This present administration inherited 18 magistrates but we discovered they were not enough and we employed additional 19 magistrates to ensure speedy dispensation of justice,’’ he said.
The attorney-general said that 17 lawyers were also recruited as public prosecutors for efficient prosecution of criminal cases. Besides, Afolabi said that the Osun House of Assembly was reviewing existing laws in the state to ensure that they conformed to the present realities.
He noted that the government had revived the Public Defender and Citizens Rights Department as well as mediation centres to enable indigent people to have access to justice via alternative dispute resolution mechanisms.
“We discovered that many people are very poor in the state and cannot employ the services of a lawyer to handle their cases. And as a result of this, when the present administration came into power, the Department of Public Defender and Citizen Rights in the Ministry of Justice was revived to help the citizens. Lawyers in the mediation centres are government employees and they render their services free of charge,’’ he said.
Commenting on the workshop, Justice Oyebola Ojo, the Chief Judge of Osun State, said that the workshop was essential, as part of efforts to carry out occasional review of strategies in the dispensation of justice.
She said that the workshop would also be useful in efforts to conduct the internal and external assessment of personnel and tools available to the judiciary for optimum service delivery.
Represented by Justice Jide Falola, Ojo said that the workshop would also expose the participants to modern techniques to sharpen their skills and motivate them.
She, however, noted that the judiciary was not funded properly as one of the three arms of government.
She commended the Osun Government for providing an atmosphere that was conducive to the work of the judiciary and lauded UNDOC for making Osun one of its seven focal states.
Appraising plans for the reform, Mr Ibrahim Lawal, Senior Special Adviser to Gov. Rauf Aregbesola on Legal Matters, said that appreciable progress had been recorded in efforts to reform the justice delivery system.
Lawal conveyed the government’s determination to reform the criminal justice system in the state.
He said that government was also striving to ensure speedy dispensation of justice, while improving the welfare package for judges and magistrates in the state.
Observers, nonetheless, underscore the need for a more aggressive justice sector reform in the country, so as to improve the criminal justice delivery system.
NAN

Photos from the Hoteliers Association’s  visit to the Governor in his Office, Osogbo, State of Osun on Wednesday 14-05-2014

The Osun State Governor, Rauf Aregbesola, has urged all religious groups in the state to continue praying for the safety and unconditional release of the abducted schoolgirls of the Government Girls Secondary School, Chibok, Borno State.
Aregbesola, who spoke through his Senior Special Assistant on Community Forum, Olatunbosun Oyintiloye, on Monday, at a special service organised to pray for the state and Nigeria, at Everlasting Rock Ministry Church, Ibokun, said the girls needed prayers, as the search by security agencies continued.
He noted that bombing, killing and kidnapping of innocent citizens by Boko Haram insurgent must not be seen as a religious issue but as a grave act of inhumanity against man.
The governor described Boko Haram insurgency as a revolt against the entire socio-political order in the country.
Aregbesola also noted that terrorism would send bad signals to investors and cripple economic activities in the affected areas and added that the menace should be fought without religious sentiment.
He also said the activities of Boko Haram were outside the tenets of Islam, which he described as a religion of love and peace. He said Boko Haram target was to destabilise the country by all means.
He said, “That is the more reason we must pray fervently and without ceasing for the unconditional release of these girls, not only in places of worships, but also in our homes too. We should pray so that they can be reunited with their families who have been in sorrow since the unfortunate incidence. We must continue to pray until these girls are released and Boko Haram insurgency in this country becomes a thing of the past.”

Aregbesola however used the occasion to urge the people to be more vigilant and report any suspicious movement or objects to security agencies.
He also urged parents to warn their children against being used by politicians to disrupt peace in the state. He also warned the people against selling their voters cards to “desperate politicians.”
OSUN DEFENDER

The chairman, Independent National Electoral Commission (INEC), Prof. Attahiru Jega, yesterday advanced reasons why the commission will not use card readers in the governorship elections in Ekiti and Osun states.
In another development, INEC, in its bid to bridge the increasing gender gap and promote mutual partnerships between men and women in the operations of the Commission and its relation with relevant stakeholders, said it was working assiduously towards articulating a proper framework for mainstreaming gender through its gender policy.
Jega, who received the United States (US) Under Secretary of State for Civilian Security, Democracy, and Human Rights, Sarah, in Abuja, explained that the interest generated by both elections would not allow  for it to be used for the pilot scheme.
Ekiti State governor, Dr Kayode Fayemi and his Osun State counterpart, Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola, had, at a fund raising dinner recently, called on INEC to rescind its decision not to use Voter Card Reader machines in the forthcoming Ekiti and Osun states  governorship elections.
But Jega said: “It will not be wise to use a pilot scheme in an election that will be keenly contested.”
He also noted that in the next three month, the commission would have been done with Permanent Voter Cards (PVC) distribution.
The INEC boss, however, gave the assurance that the commission was fully prepared to conduct free, fair and acceptable election in 2015, saying INEC was now prepared technically and in terms of personnel for the forthcoming elections.
LEADERSHIP

Stakeholders in Osun State have reviewed the government’s performance in the last 40 months, Musa Odoshimokhe was there.

The performance of the Osun State government since the inception of the Ogbeni Rauf Aregbesola’s administration came under scrutiny recently at an economic summit in Osogbo, the state capital tagged ‘Orisun Aje 2014’.
At the summit organised by the Peoples Welfare League (PWL), a non-governmental organisation, mind boggling issues bordering on the survival of the ordinary man, particularly the rising wave of unemployment and the widening gap between the rich and the poor were raised and solutions proffered.
The venue, Osogbo Holiday Inn, was full of activities during the two-day summit attended by civil servants, artisans, cottage industry owners, trade unions and politicians who rubbed minds on the way forward in the country.
The theme of the summit; ‘Crux of Economic Developmental Masterplan: Analysing Radical Economic Paradigm Shift’ captures the mood of the organisers, who believe it was time to better the lots of the people.
Osun State Governor Rauf Aregbesola in his remarks said, Nigerian masses are living at the mercy of harsh economic policies and urged government to re-evaluate the situation.
He said the reduction in states’ monthly allocation by 40 percent was a declaration of war on the Nigerians people, noting it would widen the gap between the haves and the have not.
He said government at all levels must work to reduce the poverty level to pave way for a better society, adding that the Federal Government’s unilateral decision reducing money meant for state cannot be justified.
The governor noted that the country still sells its oil at the same rate in the international market.
Aregbsola said the summit is coming at a critical moment in the country’s national life, urging policy makers to tap into it.
He said: “Summit like this is to conceptualise ideas to improve the living condition of the people. The primary focus of this summit is to look at the successes of government and advised where it has not lived up to expectation.
“I urge you to give this summit all the seriousness that it deserves because in the long run, Osun will not only be the beneficiary but the entire country will key into the outcome of the deliberation and use the formula to advance their causes.
“Osun in the last three and half years has made progress from the backwater of economic regression to the fertile place of economic abundance.
“The transformation inspired by this transition is observably manifold in areas of arresting unemployment, reducing inequality among the people, capacity building etc. I must say that Osun economy has substantially grown from where we took over the governance of the state,” he said.
The governor said Osun State has fought poverty and the result available for confirmation, stressing that the state has the lowest poverty index in Nigeria. “It is not a phantom wish, it was published in 2012. Five states in the lowest unemployment rate in Nigeria are Abia 11 percent, Oyo nine percent, Lagos eight percent, Kwara seven percent and Osun three percent.
“In the poverty index, Osun is rated second only to Niger State; however, we don’t even know their parameter for arriving at the index because Niger State is not even among the best ten on the unemployment index. So, when you marry our performance on unemployment with our crystal performance in poverty, I will say we are the best governed state in Nigeria,” Aregbesola said.
The co-chairman of the event and former Secretary General of the Organisation of Africa Trade Union Unit (OATUU), Comrade Hassan Sumonu, noted that the rapid physical transformation of Osun State indicates that the Aregbesola administration is working to better the lots of the people.
He said: “Osun State has been greatly transformed. When my tenure as Secretary General of OATUU ended, I had the choice of staying back in Accra, Ghana or coming back to live in Abuja or Lagos. However, when I visited Osun, the transformation was so massive that it struck me in a big way and I have chosen to live here ever.
“I support all the developmental initiatives that are people-oriented and capable of bringing about development. Any government that has a pact with the people must honour and fulfill that pact for such a government to remain a darling of the people.”
Sumonu advised other governors and the Federal Government on the need to study and adopt the Osun State template for socio-economic development, adding that unemployment rate in the country is growing and worrisome.
He said government at all levels must stop playing politics with the lives of the people. He stated government must embark on progra-mmes that will better the lives of the governed.
“This is the type of approach the whole country needs. The Federal Government and other states must put politics aside and see how it is possible to replicate Osun’s pragmatic approach to employment generation and wealth creation all over the country. Nigeria will be better for such selfless consideration,” he said.
The chairman of PWL, Comrade Abiodun Agboola said, the summit was organised to allow stakeholders reflect on government prog-rammes and contribute to the development of the country.
He said: “PWL, as the third eye of the public has elected to shoulder the responsibility of bringing the stakeholders together in order to assess the situation of governance in Osun State in the last 40 months in line with our tradition.”
Osun State Commissioner for Commerce and Industry, Mr. Ismailla Alagbada, in his paper entitled: “Overview of Developmental Indices Before, Now and the Projection for the Future: Osun as Microcosm in Nigeria,” said the only way government could make progress is to proactively engage the people.
“The people only appreciate government when they leave office, which is why the Aregbesola six-point agenda is squarely about the people. I must say before Are-gbesola came, infrastructure in the state was comatose. No investor in his right mind will come to such a state except the situation was redressed.”
Corroborating the position of the commissioner, Prof. Oyesoji Aremu in a paper titled: “Welfarism and People Oriented Development: Modern Governance Ethos” said government must be transparent and accountable to the people for it to be trusted.
He urged government to create the enabling environment that will ensure economic growth.
“That is why we have most of the challenges now confronting the country in form of insurgency because concerted efforts have not been directed to it. Regrettably, when you have insurgency it cannot be completely wiped out, you can only manage it,” he said.
THE NATION

The State of Osun Security Council Monday evening described the jungle justice being meted to suspected kidnappers and ritual killing suspects as wicked, uncivilised and therefore unacceptable to the government.
In a press conference jointly addressed after a crucial meeting, all the heads of security agencies said the act of jungle justice is totally condemnable, warning that government will not fold its arms and allow the society to descend into anarchy.
The security chiefs included the army, police, State Security Service, NDLEA, Immigration, Head of Prison Service, and the Federal Road Safety Commission.
The meeting came on the heel of recent wave of summary arrest of suspected kidnappers and burning them in some towns in the state.
The statement, read on behalf of the security chiefs by the Commissioner of Police, Ibrahim Maishanu, warned that any individual or group of people, found taking laws into their own hands by killing any suspect illegally would be made to face murder charge.
Maisanu said the security agencies have the capacity and network to track any individual or group that takes laws unto itself, warning the people of the state to hand over any suspected person to the police or the nearest security agencies rather than turn themselves into executioners.
“The act of dishing jungle justice to suspects is therefore barbaric, uncivilised and unacceptable in a governed society. The security agencies will not fold their arms and watch our society descend into anarchy.
“By this token, any person or group of persons that constitutes a mob, takes laws into his or their hands and lynch any suspect is not morally or legally better than the suspects. Such person or group of persons will be caught and made to face murder charges, which is punishable by death,” Maisanu said.
The police command boss averred that in an organised society, every citizen is involved in law enforcement through vigilance, report of suspicious and criminal activities to law enforcement agencies and in some cases, carrying out citizen’s arrest.
He stated that whenever any suspect is arrested, the lawful thing to do is to handover the suspect immediately to the police.
The police commissioner noted that there is never a time a citizen is allowed to take laws into his or her own hands and become the complainant, jury and executioner – meting out jungle justice based on his or her own whims and caprices.
According to the police chief there is the rule of law under democratic rule and it is the sacred duty of law enforcement agencies to uphold the law, enforce the law, apprehend criminals and make sure that criminal suspects face the law.
He reaffirmed the security agencies commitment and determination to maintaining and protecting lives and property and above all the fundamental liberty of all.
He continued: “This is what we do every day, 24 hours. It is on record that, with the assistance and cooperation we have received from the state government, criminals have been deterred in Osun and the state has one of the lowest crime rates in the country.
“It is also a fundamental axiom of justice that an accused person is deemed innocent until proven guilty. It is the sacred duty of the courts to determine and establish guilt or innocence and impose appropriate punishment. This is because a mistake, especially of identity or mission, can occur.
“Mistakes of this nature, therefore, once made, are irreversible and an innocent life would have been taken. Where the suspects were burnt to death, for instance, it is difficult or impossible to establish their identity and consequently establish their guilt or innocence.”

Governor Rauf Aregbesola of Osun State has reiterated the commitment of his government to total abolition of poverty in the state, stressing that his administration is committed to the welfare of the people of the state.
The governor, who spoke in Osogbo, the state capital after the disbursement of N600 million to select women in the state, stressed that his administration was driven by egalitarianism and equity.
Aregbesola hinted that his administration had committed much resources to ensure total alleviation of poverty in the state to make life more meaningful to the citizenry, especially the women.
He said the state government had partnered Grooming Micro Finance centre, Lagos to bring lasting solution to the problem of poverty among the people of the state.
The governor disclosed that over 18,000 women had benefited from various loan schemes of his administration since the inception of his administration, adding that more women and youths would still benefit from the government in the area of empowerment.
He said: “We are committed to our crusade against poverty and we will not relent on our oars to ensure that poverty is wiped out in a promising state like Osun, despite the meager resources available to our administration.
“As a government, we have realised that development is incomplete without consideration to the human aspect. Ours is a combination of both infrastructural and human development,” he added
DAILY SUN

I would like to first address the barrage of western media coverage of the unconscionable act of the abduction of over 270 of our daughters and children in Chibok about three weeks ago. I want to state categorically that this is a sad time in the history of our nation with our daughters missing. The question is does this event warrant the nonstop barrage by the western press on our country and how ‘we’ and our country are failures?  Nigeria all of a sudden is a pariah in the world stage because of this single event carried out by evil men?
Let us take a step back in the not too distant history, did the event of September 11^th 2011 not happen in the United States with over 4,000 lives lost on a single day in a single location? Did the terrorist bombing on the London Underground not happen in July 2005 in the United Kingdom with several lives lost? Did the governments and people of these countries become pariahs on the world stage? All nations and people worldwide rallied around the people of these western countries to condemn and support them through the difficult period in their history. The people and most importantly of the UK and USA learnt from these incidents, looking at root causes and taking preventive action to avoid a repeat of those horrendous incidents. Nigerians need to proudly be united at this difficult time and ensure this never happens again.
We must and will find our girls with the assistance we are now receiving from several countries but as a nation and people, we need to address a few issues.
The incident at Chibok was a failure of leadership, whose leadership you may ask? Failure of leadership of you and I; not just the Federal Government of Nigeria or the state governments alone.
As a people, we have buried our heads in sand individually like ostriches, with no concern for our fellow Nigerians, while this may have been more rampant with the political class, we have all stood by over the last few years of our democracy watching as the divide between the rich and poor grew wider, equality in standards no longer existed in the nation our fathers and fore father fought and died for. The middle class disappeared and we just watched; it is not my business! I am not a politician! As long as I can feed my immediate family, nothing else matters! “We the people” had the power through the ballot box to engender change, put true servant leaders in leadership positions with policies and programs to deal with germane issues of infrastructure, development, improving the economic lot of Nigerians as a people both now but most importantly for the future but we keep failing in this regard! We allow a few miscreants without vision or leadership qualities either get voted or rigged into office. That is a topic of discussion for another day and piece though!
Let’s get back to the issue at hand, why did Chibok happen? What do we need to do to avoid a repeat! Are there local solutions that have worked anywhere in the African or Nigerian environment?
Respectfully, I put it to you that Chibok happened due to a lack of engagement of the youth in our environment. It happened because of the inequality of standard of living between the ‘haves’ and ‘have-nots’ that are neighbors in my country and the flagrant display of ill gotten wealth.
Rather than engage our youths constructively, they were used for political gains, stupidly in most instances armed and then dumped by their political benefactors! What do young people in this situation do? Help themselves through violence and crime! Why are we surprised!
It is at this point that I will like to refer our leaders and but most especially you, the reader of this piece and our nation to one of the states in Nigeria, the state of Osun where a guy who calls himself ‘Mister’ Governor has lead his team and positively dealt with a variant of this issue of youth engagement, personal self worth, building bridges and security through various programs of which I will only focus on one, the OYES program.
In 3 years, 40,000 unemployed youths were engaged by the leadership of this state between 2011 and 2013, what do you as an intelligent Nigerian think happened to crime rate in the State of Osun? Of course it went down! These were individuals that were sitting at home frustrated with themselves, their parents, community and of course their government. These were youths that had little or no self worth of themselves now adding value to their community. Waking up in the morning and having a sense of purpose, dignity in contributing to their community and environment but most importantly being taught life skills on independence. Some of the graduates of this scheme have become farmers, business owners etc. The first female ambulance driver in Nigeria is a graduate of this scheme.
Is this scheme an end all be all solution to our issues? No, but it is a bridge, a solution in the right direction. My fellow compatriots and lovers of our nation, why would the World Bank recognised this initiative as a solution that addresses youth engagement in developing countries but we in Nigeria cannot see the benefits as leverage! Forget whose innovation it was, forget their political party, let us as a people begin to use what has worked or is working towards the development of our nation, Nigeria, the giant of Africa.
I know I said I will only mention one thing but pardon me I just love my country too much.
When will you and I start holding our leaders to account to implement policies that may not be popular but that positively impact and benefit our people? In Tanzania, Julius Nyerere changed the national language from English to Swahili to bring about unity of purpose amongst the several tribes and languages in his country; today the people are stronger as a nation. Nkrumah in Ghana made the ‘Kenteh’ the uniform of the nation, can you imagine the number of jobs that policy created and maintains in their textile industry, what that that single policy has done and continues to do for the Ghanaian economy?
In the State of Osun, Rauf Aregbesola, Mr. Governor introduced a single free uniform for all students in primary and secondary schools. All the uniforms are produced in his state making over 3,000 unemployed people get trained as tailors with a feeder system with new student intakes and replacements yearly, is it a surprise that the Nigerian Federal Bureau of Statistics named Osun the state with the least unemployment in 2013 with less than 3%.
While I’m not a statistician, I was at a forum a few days ago when someone said that Katsina and Kano indigenes at some point in the history of Nigeria formed around 20% of the manufacturing workforce because of the textile industry, which is now docile!
Can you imagine what it would mean to unengaged youths in the state of Katsina and Kano, even the entire northern Nigeria if the Federal government of Nigeria made ‘Ankara’ the uniform of this nation with all civil servants wearing it with minimal deduction made from their salaries. Cap that with a ban on importation of fabrics into Nigeria, and BOOM! What happens to the economy of northern Nigeria, it explodes with jobs and industry
Leadership is not always about being the innovator, it is about leveraging and implementing policies and solutions that have or are working. Leadership is about taking tough decisions, probably rejected by a few but to the benefit of the majority.
Nigeria, bring back our girls but most importantly, start the process to avoid a repeat of Chibok.
Dotun Babayemi writes from Gbongan, Aiyedaade local government, State of Osun.