From High Court and Magistrate Courts Kubwa to Wuse Zone 2 Magistrate Complex, the courts are being painted, giving the perimeter walls some brushes of freshness.
But like a whitewashed sepulcher, the inside cries for beautification.
Signs, color and symbols are powerful tools, physical representation of the true state of things in the spiritual realm. Plato’s theory of Forms and Ideas comes to mind. After all Justice is an abstract, manifested by physical representation of Lady Justice and other paraphernalia of the judicial system.
The first sign that assaults that all is not well, is the battered status of Lady Justice. Instead of to inspire awe, confidence and hope to those in need of a squeeze of justice from her breast, this status is scary, incompetently dressed.
Her scale, the symbol of impartiality, is missing, one wonders if we are equal before her.
Also missing is her sword, the instrument with which she delivers justice, no matter whose ox is gored. Or is the court telling us that it is now a toothless bull dog, her orders no longer worth the paper on which it is written?
The furniture in the courts, are in dire need of repairs or complete replacement.
The filing system leaves dripping tears. Case files are dumped on the floor. The very few file cabinets are over stuffed.
The greatest suffer head of them all, is the recording system in the court. Judges still write in laborious long hand. We are aware that sometimes ago, laptops were provided for these judges, ICT gadgets set up in courts but surprisingly, all the judges in Kubwa High Court, use long hand and pre-Sapara Williams note books to take records of proceedings.
Power supply is epileptic and the generator only comes on when my Lord is sitting. Once she raises, the entire complex is thrown into darkness.This delays clerical and other administrative works that are required to aid speedy administration of justice in the FCT.
The staff still notoriously come late to work and hardly will you see a 9 O’clock judge in Kubwa.
