As a matter of urgency, our courts registries must be sanitised, J.S. Okutepa

• NBA leadership must fish out good judicial officers for praise and commendation

From 23rd of August 2025 to 29th of August 2025, the Nigerian Bar Association annual general conference will be held in Enugu, the Coal City as it is called. As usual, various topics have been lined up for discussion. I did not see in the topic the most dreadful and cancerous diseases that have retarded Nigeria’s growth and development. The diseases are impunity and corruption.

Nigeria is today suffering from lawlessness, which is a product of impunity and corruption. Today, things are done not according to law and due process but according to the whims and caprices of those who occupy positions of responsibility. Power is not used to better the lives of people but to impoverish them.

I have said time and time again that we talk and we do nothing. That there is corruption everywhere in Nigeria is a fact too notorious to be denied by any decent mind. I do not know how we got here. Everyone in positions seems not ready to work without demanding kickbacks. Even in the most sensitive areas in government, people still demand kickbacks before working. Nigeria’s situation is tough. Just report a case to security agencies and see how those who have to do the investigations make demands on you.

There are no areas spared from these cancers of impunity and corruption. It is everywhere you go in Nigeria. It is at the airports. Just last week, someone attempted to stop a plane from taking off. There is impunity everywhere. It is there at motor parks and garages across Nigeria. The registries of our courts are also corrupt and infested. Most of the staff there won’t work and process court processes unless bribed. They openly make demands on lawyers..SANs are at their mercy in most cases. Not only did they make demands, but they also exhibited a corrupt entitlement mentality.

Those who have your number call you at will to make bogus and unreasonable requests rooted in demands, and they think it is their right to do so. These sets of people constitute the greatest threats to justice in our courts. It is worse at the Court of Appeal registries across Nigeria and, of course, the Supreme Court. Even those admitted to bail suffered terribly in the hands of these sets of court staff. I hope the NBA leadership will save lawyers from harassment and these embarrassing situations. We need to engage the leadership of the judiciary at all levels to sanitise the registries of our courts. In fact, let us digitalise the registries of our courts.

The Attorneys-General of the States and that of the Federation, in collaboration with the NBA, must work on these issues urgently. It is not enough to place the blame for corruption in the justice sector on judicial officers. It is unkind to do so without taking a look at the registries of our courts. The manner we have developed an intolerable appetite for impunity and corruption, and even abnormalities in our justice sector, needs to be visited and reversed. Cases take years and years to be attended to. Judicial pronouncements must be prompt and precise.

Delay in assignments of cases and failure to give immediate justice have become our bane. The annual general conference of the NBA must be bold and practical in approaching these cantankerous cankerworms of impunity and corruption in our national life. To execute judgments in Nigeria is another kettle of fish altogether. The attitudes of some lawyers are, to say the least, a disgrace to the nobility of the legal profession. Some lawyers openly obstruct the cause of justice instead of promoting it by the kind of frivolous processes they file to stall the attainment of justice. The NBA must heal itself of the internal hemorrhage inflicted on it by its members who destroy and desecrate the institution of justice by the influences and impunity they exhibited with audacity of arrogance rooted in lawlessness.

The majority of Nigerian judicial officers are not as corrupt as they appear. Decent judicial officers are working in very unhygienic and traumatised environments that always give them high blood pressure. These sets of judicial officers can not talk, and they must not be seen to be talking. Some of these staff in the registries, even in most cases, acted in sabotage of these good judicial officers.

These facts must be appreciated and emphasised. The NBA leadership must fish out good judicial officers for praise and commendations. Encourage them not to give up while ensuring that those who pollute the stream of justice are dealt with decisively without compromise. This is one of the ways of restoring and boosting the confidence of Nigerians in our justice delivery system. We must make bold demands and follow through with actions. Nigerians look to us lawyers as a light. We, as lawyers, therefore must lead the fight for the restoration of sanity in governance in Nigeria.