The Attorney General of the Federation and Minister of Justice, Lateef Fagbemi, SAN, Tuesday unveiled new guidelines for the implementation of plea bargaining in line with the Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015 (ACJA).
The official presentation of the document for federal prosecutors was made at a sensitisation workshop held in Abuja.
The Inspector General of Police, IGP Olukayode Egbetokun, Dr Oluwatoyin Badejobi, representing RoLAC, Professor Fatima Waziri of NAPTIP, Controller General of Nigerian Correctional Service, representatives from the EFCC, ICPC, and the NDLEA all gave a goodwill messages at the ceremony.
The hallmark of the occasion was the unveiling of the new guidelines before all stakeholders.
Giving a keynote address at the ceremony, the minister said the need to reduce case backlog, congestion of correctional centres, need to enhance principles of accountability, equity, integrity and transparency among others necessitated the new developments.
Fagbemi said the move would also help prosecutors to exercise discretion on plea bargain in line with international best practices.
He said: “The objective of these guidelines is to, inter alia, guide the prosecution and the defence in reaching a plea bargain agreement that is in the interest of justice, the public interest, public policy and the need to prevent abuse of legal process.
“It is my conviction that these guidelines will enhance public confidence in plea bargaining process in Nigeria, and it will also help in the management of the caseload of prosecutors and enable the state to concentrate its limited resources on the cases considered more deserving of full prosecution.”
