El-Rufai swears in four High Court judges

Kaduna State Governor, Nasir El-Rufai, Tuesday swore in four newly appointed High Court judges in the state.

In his address at the event, the governor said the state has been seeking the appointment of high court judges in the last three years.

The newly sworn in judges are – Amina Bello, Ambo John, Rabi Oladoja and Andow Edward.

He said: “Though, only four were appointed, but the state requires about 20 judges to compliment the current ones, who are overworked.

“Each of our High Court in the state has a minimum of 200 cases, which is too much for them to handle and therefore, affect the administration of justice.

“To this end, the state needs more judges as we have the capacity to make their work easier with the provision of housing and vehicles, among other necessary things.”

El-Rufai, however, said the only bottleneck in this regard is the bureaucracy in the National Judicial Council which causes delay in judges’ appointment.

He said: “In my opinion, the NJC should only select judges for the appellate and federal courts and leave the selection of judges for state high courts to an equivalent Council at the state level, either the State Judicial Service Commission which now appoints Magistrate or the State Judicial Council which select judges.

“I do not believe that the appointment of high court judges at the state level should be within the purview of the NJC.

“We are trying to operate a unitary judiciary when we have a Federal Executive and Legislature, this needs to be corrected.”