Justice Aisha Bashir, the Chief Judge of Nasarawa State, has granted amnesty to 47 prisoners awaiting trial in Lafia, Keffi, and Nasarawa.
Bashir, the state’s first female Chief Judge, announced this on Thursday in Wamba Local Government Area (LGA) following her first tour of custodian centres since taking office in December 2020.
Recall that Bashir was appointed on December 31, 2020, following the retirement of former Chief Justice Sulieman Dikko.
she explained that the visit is in accordance with the president’s order to decongest custodian facilities as part of a strategy to stop COVID-19 from spreading further.
30 inmates were released from the Lafia Custodian Centre, six from the Nasarawa Custodian Centre, eight from the Keffi Custodian Centre, and three from the Wamba Custodian Centre.
”Under my leadership, the state judiciary will work to ensure that justice is administered quickly and that the threat of justice stagnation is addressed. ”
“The state’s Criminal Justice Committee will soon come up with modalities to ensure that those whose cases have been stalled for years get their cases resolved and justice delivered.
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“I’ve also requested that the lists of prisoners who have stayed for five years or more be collected for submission to the state’s Executive Governor for pardon.
“As part of our efforts to ensure justice is done as well as decongest custodial facilities, we propose to the governor to grant them pardon,” the CJ said.
She also praised the Custodian Centres’ administrators for teaching inmates a variety of skills and enrolling those who were interested in education at the Open University.
According to Justice Bashir, such actions by the authorities would truly rehabilitate the prisoners and make them usable after they had served their sentence.
The CJ also urged those who had been released to work hard to persuade society that they had improved and to regain society’s faith and trust.
Judges, Legal Aid Council of Nigeria, and the National Human Rights Commission, among others, accompanied the CJ on her tour.
