By George Mgbeleke<\/p>\n
President Bola Tinubu on Thursday asked the Senate to approve the repeal of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015 and replace it with a new legal framework designed to tackle delays in criminal trials, strengthen justice sector institutions and modernise Nigeria’s criminal justice system.<\/p>\n
The executive bill was conveyed in a letter addressed to Senate President Godswill Akpabio and read during Thursday’s plenary.<\/p>\n
In his communication on the criminal justice reform, Tinubu said the proposed Administration of Criminal Justice Bill, 2026, would repeal and replace the existing ACJA 2015 to address persistent legal, procedural and institutional shortcomings that have undermined effective justice delivery.<\/p>\n
He explained that the proposed legislation would improve the administration of criminal justice in the Federal Capital Territory and other federal courts, while strengthening the Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Council to ensure effective implementation of the law.<\/p>\n
According to the President, the new legal framework is intended to promote efficient management of criminal justice institutions, accelerate the dispensation of justice, strengthen the protection of society from crime and safeguard the constitutional rights of suspects, defendants, victims and witnesses.<\/p>\n
Tinubu said the bill would also ensure full compliance by courts, law enforcement agencies and other institutions involved in criminal justice administration.<\/p>\n
He identified chronic delays in criminal investigations and prosecutions, poor case-file management, inadequate deployment of technology in criminal proceedings, weak coordination among justice sector agencies, ineffective case management systems and poor monitoring of compliance with the existing law as major challenges necessitating the repeal of the 2015 Act.<\/p>\n
The President noted that the draft legislation was prepared by experienced law officers with expertise in criminal law, criminal procedure and legislative drafting, adding that it incorporated recent judicial pronouncements, technological innovations and international best practices.<\/p>\n
He added that the proposed law would strengthen the Administration of Criminal Justice Monitoring Council through enhanced monitoring and evaluation mechanisms to ensure effective implementation by relevant institutions.<\/p>\n
Following the presentation of the communication, the Senate referred the bill to its Committee on Rules and Business with a directive to report back within four weeks.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
By George Mgbeleke President Bola Tinubu on Thursday asked the Senate to approve the repeal of the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) 2015 and replace it with a new legal framework designed to tackle delays in criminal trials, strengthen justice sector institutions and modernise Nigeria’s criminal justice system. The executive bill was conveyed in […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14881,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-15401","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-law-crime"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15401","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=15401"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15401\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":15402,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/15401\/revisions\/15402"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/14881"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=15401"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=15401"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dailyechoes.ng\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=15401"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}