Uzor Orji Kalu, chief whip of the senate, is proposing some
amendments to the Administration of Criminal Justice Act (ACJA) of 2015.
The bill entitled, ‘administration of criminal justice act
2015 (amendment) bill’, 2020 was introduced on Wednesday after Nelson Ayewoh,
senate clerk, read its short title.
The former governor of Abia state was released from the Kuje
Correctional Centre on June 2. He had spent five months in prison.
In December, a federal high court in Lagos convicted the
chief whip of money laundering to the tune of N7.1 billion.
He stood trial alongside Ude Jones Udeogu, a former director
of finance and account in Abia.
But on May 8, the supreme court nullified the conviction of
Kalu and Udeogu on the grounds that Mohammed Idris, the trial judge, did not
have jurisdiction to hear the matter since he had been elevated to the court of
appeal.
The whip attended his first plenary session after his
release from prison on June 9.
The bill is Kalu’s first since he resumed the plenary
session.
Although the details of the amendment bill have not been
made public, it may border on decongesting the prisons.
After the court nullified his conviction, Kalu lamented that
over 70 percent of the population in prison are awaiting trial.
“I shall be dedicating my time henceforth to ensuring there
will be justice for all Nigerians whether they are in Sokoto or Akwa Ibom or in
Lagos or Maiduguri or in Jos or Enugu, or wherever they may be,” he said in a
statement in May.
“A system whereby over 70% of all prison inmates population
is made up of people awaiting trial cannot be allowed to continue. Situations
where innocent people are falsely charged with murder just to get them out of
the way does not dignify our country and cannot continue.
“Justice must now mean justice for all. That is my pledge to
Nigerians.”
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