Fred Ezeh, Abuja
The Hague Institute for Innovation of Law (HiiL), a social enterprise devoted to user-friendly justice, has decried the poor justice system in Nigeria, saying it has forced millions of Nigeria to loose faith and trust in the system and to seek alternative source of justice.
The HiiL disclosed this in a recent research on Nigeria where it revealed that no fewer than about 14 million Nigerians have had their problem unresolved annually through legal means.
HiiL Country Representative for Nigeria, Ijeoma Nwafor, stated this, yesterday, at a stakeholders meeting on the need for increased access to justice in Abuja. She said most Nigerians take active steps to get legal justice, but ended up dropping the case due to loss of faith and trust in the justice system.
The meeting which had in attendance officials of the Federal Ministry of Justice, Correction Centres, Police, Immigration and other agencies of government involved in the delivery of justice, focused on promoting other measures through which justice can be served.
“More than 25 million people encounter legal problems annually. Almost 18 million attempt to achieve resolution to their disputes, while seven million decide not to take any action to resolve their problems for some reasons. People who seek legal information and advice, most likely, take action towards achieving that.
“In the cause of our findings, we discovered that many people, deliberately, seek justice from other sources, notably, respected community members, neighbours, family heads, religious authorities and several other options,” Nwafor said.