The Public, Private Development Centre (PPDC), a Non Governmental Organisation, says it is partnering the Ebonyi Government to digitise, strengthen and improve access to the state’s criminal justice system.
Mrs Lucy Abagi, the Centre’s Chief Executive Officer (CEO) stated this on Tuesday in Abakaliki when she led officials of the organisation to interface with officials of the Ebonyi Ministry of Justice and the judiciary.
Abagi noted that digitising and automating the court and judicial processes would enhance access to criminal justice and also speed up justice delivery.
She said that the project was funded with support from the United States Department of State Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs.
According to her, the project which has a one year duration is aimed at expansion of the Court Administration and Case Management (CACM) and has been expanded to Oyo and Ebonyi.
She noted that the project had been successfully implemented in Nasarawa, Kaduna, and Plateau States respectively.
“The CACM project focuses on enhancing Nigeria’s criminal justice system’s capacity, efficiency, and accountability by improving court case management, better controlling the preservation and storage of evidence.
“The initiative seeks to optimise scheduling systems for court sessions, hearing and streamlining court administration processes.
“So far, the project has achieved impressive results in the pilot states, including archiving 2,276 criminal case files at the Judicial Record Centres (JRC) across the three states of Nasarawa, Kaduna and Plateau.
The CEO said it had uploaded 902 case files onto a newly developed Case Management System.t
She added that two virtual hearing facilities were installed, allowing inmates to attend court hearings directly from custodial centers.
“This innovation significantly improves judicial efficiency by reducing delays often caused by the logistical challenges of transporting inmates to and from court.
“So, we are in Ebonyi to meet with high level stakeholders; we came to meet with the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice here in Ebonyi and we came to meet with the Chief Judge of the state.
“We are here not only to seek partnership and support of state government to digitise the courts and judicial processes but also to get their buy-ins to ensure that court processes are seamless,” Abagi said.
She explained that digitising and automating the court processes and records would allow for timely and quick dispensation of justice.
“This means that we are going to reduce the delay in access to justice.
“This innovation significantly improves judicial efficiency by reducing delays often caused by the logistical challenges of transporting inmates to and from court and also minimises security risks and the costs associated with physical transfers.”
Mr Kenechukwu Agu, the senior programme officer in the centre noted that the essence of digitising and automating the courts and judicial processes were to reduce the number of awaiting trial inmates in Nigeria Custodial Centres.
“What we are thinking of doing and what has been approved by our donors is to establish digital courts in our existing courts.
“Our system does digital recording, it does speech to text transcription, it also does video recording and playback.
“So, what happens is that judges will stop writing in long hands and just take notes and what we are doing is that immediately the judge rises, you can just print a copy of everything that transpired in court.
“Ditising helps to ensure accountability and reduces the amount of time spent and increase the number of cases that can be heard in a day,” Agwu said.
Speaking, Justice Elvis Ngene, the Chief Judge of Ebonyi, thanked the team and expressed strong commitment to ensuring that the digitisation of courts and judicial processes in the state was seamlessly achieved.
The CJ assured it that the state would key into the project and would surpass other pilot states in implementing the digitisation project.
Meanwhile, Dr Ben Odoh, the Attorney General and Commissioner for Justice, said that the state would pay its counterpart fund and ensured that the project was effectively implemented in the state.
He also pledged that Ebonyi government would sustain the project after the expiration of one year duration of the project.
He said: “I’m excited. One of the aspirational legacies I penned down to achieve on my appointment as the chief superintendent of the judicial system of the state is to digitise and automate the whole court system and the ministry of justice.
“We have started that on our own and then when we saw this opening of having an international linkage with PPDC, I quickly wrote to them and asked for their intervention,” Odoh said.
The commissioner announced the donation of operational office situated within the ministry to the centre to enhance their operations and activities in the state.
The News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) reports that the centre also interfaced with officials of the Abakaliki Medium Correctional Centre. (NAN)
