Friday, November 16, 2012

EFCC, ex-CJN disagree on plea bargain


Economic and Financial Crimes Commission and former Chief Justice of Nigeria, Justice Dahiru Musdapher, on Thursday disagreed over the application of plea bargain in the country’s criminal justice system.
This emerged at the Alternative Dispute Resolution Summit organised by the Negotiation and Conflict Management Group and the National Judicial Institute, Abuja.
The theme of the summit was ‘Plea Bargaining: A Threat or Promise to Criminal Justice System in Africa?’
The summit was also attended by the CJN, Justice Aloma Mukhtar, and an ex-CJN, Justice Muhammadu Uwais.
In his address, Musdapher, who recently stepped down as CJN after attaining the mandatory retirement age of 70 years, restated his opposition to plea bargain, describing it as “dubious”.
He said, “I still stand to state that the concept is not only dubious but was never part of the history of our legal system – at least until it was surreptitiously smuggled into our statutory laws with the creation of the EFCC.”
He stressed that a proper understanding of the concept was needed to correct the “misconception that what is being plea bargained is the proceeds of the crime rather than the crime itself with a view to handing out a lesser punishment for the offence committed”.
The ex-CJN added, “The essence of the concept is the recovery of stolen money and therefore not subject to negotiation. What is subject to negotiation should be the prosecution and punishment for embezzlement.
“Even where the stolen money is returned by the offender, he has committed this offence of theft or abuse of office for which he must still be tried and punished.
“I would say that the concept of plea bargain is indeed a threat to our criminal justice system in Africa and can only turn into a promise with the eradication of corruption and the right application of the concept.”
But the Chairman of the EFCC, Mr. Ibrahim Lamorde, in his presentation, said the advantages of plea bargain were “incomparable with the alleged disadvantages”.
Pointing to the delays in the trial of some former governors charged with corruption, Lamorde said the EFCC was able to employ plea bargain to conclude some high profile cases, including those involving Emmanuel Nwude; former Inspector-General of Police, Tafa Balogun; former Bayelsa State Governor Diepreye Alamieyeseigha, Cecilia Ibru and former Edo State Governor Lucky Igbinedion.
He said the EFCC appealed against some unsatisfactory parts of the judgment in the Igbinedion case, as the anti-graft agency disagreed with the verdict which fined the former governor.
Although he didn’t say if the EFCC would employ plea bargain to conclude the outstanding cases against some former governors, he accused them of frustrating the prosecutions.
Lamorde said, “We are all witnesses to the fact that cases commenced as far back as 2007 against some former governors like Uzor Kalu, Chimaroke Nnamani, Saminu Turaki, Joshua Dariye have hardly made any meaningful progress in their trials because of regular exploitation of the inherent problems in the justice system to truncate the trials.”

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