Godstime Simon
CLEEN Foundation, a nonprofit organisation, has called for an improved budgetary allocation for the effective implementation of the Administration of Criminal Justice Law (ACJL) in Nigeria.
The call was made during a media workshop recently held in CLEEN Foundation’s Lagos Office.
The Executive Director of CLEEN Foundation, Mr Peter Maduoma, said that the worrisome challenges that the ACJL faces has brought about a fall short of expectations.
According to him, the reasons ACJL is not working are due to a lack of advocacy and improved budgetary allocation for effective implementation. He noted that this problem cuts across eight states in which the CLEEN Foundation has worked.
Maduoma further said: “Funding and budgetary allocation for ACJL remained issues of concern across the eight states we have worked in. The Government itself is not deliberately budgeting for the implementation of the ACJL, for it to be functional across the states of the federation.
“We have also found a situation where so much money is budgeted for building houses, offices and bridges, but no substantial amount is allocated for achieving the implementation of the ACJL.
“This therefore has continued to weaken the ACJL in Nigeria because we believe that effective implementation runs with money. The government continues to say that it wants to provide an enabling environment for Nigerians to thrive, but the government forgot that the ACJL is not functioning due to inadequate funding, making it difficult for Nigerians to live in peace, while criminals continue to roam and thrive.
“The members of the House of Assembly, who do their presentations should note that money needs to be put into the Criminal Justice System so that Nigerians can live a quiet and peaceful life, and have a society free of menace and vices, where growth and development can take place.”
Maduoma said that since the media is the fourth Estate of the realm, it means that if the media chooses to make noise about the effect of poor budgetary on ACJL, then Nigerians will also hear and comprehend.
He said that although the CLEEN Foundation sometimes intervenes in such worrisome issues, however, the sustainability of such projects is at the hands of the media and Nigerians.
Maduoma said: “We call on the press to join in this fight. If the press goes silent in terms of the implementation of criminal justice in Nigeria, we won’t get the role that particular law needs to play, to bring about a social order and an environment where all of us can live without molestations.
“We all know the focus of the Department of the Criminal Justice is to ensure that those who are criminals or violators of human rights are brought to book, this is what the ACJL brings to different states.
“There are states where there is no coordination among the people who are implementing the law such as the Police, Law Court, the Minister Of Justice and all the stakeholders. They are not coordinated and that is why we enacted this so that they can work together.
“Another challenge we have found, which we want to amplify, is that the money that needs to go into the various states for ACJL implementation has not been approved, which makes some of them start making use of their money in their various units. We think that this is a holistic thing when it comes to implementation because budget is key and this can now be described as the catalyst for corruption.
“We at CLEEN Foundation try to ensure that some of the things we have done at the beginning of the project are not lost. We think that the media is first because we have engaged the government, and government mercenaries at every level, both legislative and executive in different states. We think that the media is a worthy ally that can continue what we have achieved on this project.”
Maduoma said that the CLEEN Foundation was calling on the media to note that even if the project is about to end, “we need the media to run what we have agreed and highlight what would bring about the effective and efficient implementation of the ACJL.”
The Programme Director for CLEEN Foundation, Dr. Salaudeen Hashim, said that a movement was required for the effectiveness and efficiency of the ACJL.
Hashim also said that it was the duty of every state to combat crime, stressing that the medium and system of how each state does this, is what is referred to as the criminal justice.
He also that Criminal Justice requires a movement that will the functional and efficient for the state to see it fit to act.
He also said: “Unfortunately, there hasn’t been any form of will in terms of resourcing to allow that particular will at the state level to function efficiently. We thought that perhaps the state itself has a level of political influence on all the judiciary, which makes the budgetary support completely dependent on the judiciary, which will make the state do the bidding of the political elite. We think that this is one big problem we need to tackle.
“According to a review of the 2025 Budget of 35 states in Nigeria, we realise that over N245 billion has been allocated to local security guards and setting up local security infrastructure, procuring guns for Defence, but nobody from across the state has deliberately put in so much to ensure that there is efficient functionality of the ACJL in most of the states. We find such an oversight a big deficiency on the part of the states.
“At the national level, the 2024 Budget provided only a partial sum of N73 million for the implementation of ACJL and we think that is not very good when we are investing a billion for the renovation of offices.
“One of the things we have discovered at the state level and across the board is that people would rather put money into a capital project that has a backdoor, which they know they can get out of it, rather than put such money into programmes that will fund the entire system.
“As a matter of fact, in some states, we notice that the setting up of the ACJL Monitoring Committee, which should monitor compliance of all the criminal justice actors within the value chain is missing because we only have it set up in eight states.
“Some states don’t have it set up and some states where they have it set up are not properly funded and inaugurated. One thing that comes to mind now is why is the state afraid to adequately resource the implementation of the ACJL.
“The ACJL is very efficient and is one of the modern legislatures that will reduce right violations and infractions, as well as speed up trials. Yet money is not being put into it for it to function. It is a case of robbing the society!”
