My Story

We and our "E MABINU" Culture
by Efere Ozako

The common complaint one gets is that the process of enforcing your rights, in any manner, either getting compensation or even just pushing for things to be done properly, is so tedious that before you sue anyone you had better give birth to a child that touted is that of the Apostolic Church which finally got its lands back after a cease that took all of about fifty years.  Who has that time?

Sadly, it seems that our judges thrive on adjourning cases indefinitely: That there are some very lazy judges is what a lot won’t dispute, but they always seem to wake up long enough to grant the occasional controversial Experte Injunction.  Not to worry, help is nigh.  Some young vibrant Attorney Generals have started the process of change. Lagos State has just put in place the new High Court  laws that are geared to speed up the process of litigation and the time within which court cases are heard and disposed of.  I would however advise that more is done to educate the populace of the gains of these, than has been the case.  These rules were in fact always there, in one form or the other, but either the lawyers were too lazy to apply them or the judges not conversation to insist on them.  This must therefore change.

There are also some institutions in Lagos State, like the Citizen Mediation Council, that help in the protection of the rights of the indigent and while they might scream that the numbers of those that have come to them are swelling I can assure them that more would have come if they knew their rights.  So they must also factor in the education, not only of those that come to them, but o the general populace regarding their rights.

Our courts must also be made more user-friendly.  The way they are presently set up helps this voodoo mentality that I had talked about.  It’s gladdening the Judiciary has now seen the need to cultivate the Alternative Dispute Resolution method, which hears matters in an informal, convivial manner, as against the norm in the regular court.  Again, a lot more people should know about it, and this enlightenment of the public about its workings should not be confined to the law pages of the newspapers, but should be on every other page, even the sports pages, if need be. Everyone must know about it, and now.

I find that very few citizens know that irresponsibility, corruption and rascality by police officers are not condoned by the upper echelon of the Force.  There is the “X” squad that has been set up to deal with this.  I have had cause to make a report to them and I can assure you that I had a heart warming experience, as it is manned by some very intelligent members of the Force (I wonder why that sound like an oxymoron).  I do not want to go as far as to say they are the cream of the force, but if you have to catch a thief, you have to b e smarter than him, if you get my meaning.

As with the police, a lot of professions and bodies have disciplinary “squads” and where none exists, report the person to Sola Salako, a consumer rights watchdog and advocate.  Although this description is rather confining of what she does on the pages of This Day Newspaper, it has proven to be quite effective.

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Last Edited on June 18, 2006, 12:00 am.  This page has been viewed 654 times

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