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ARINZE NWAFOR
The Lagos state governor, Babajide Sanwo-Olu, has assured executive support for the state’s judiciary and pledged the completion of outstanding court building projects, including Tapa court, as he marked the start of the 2023/ 2024 legal year.
Sanwo-Olu, alongside the Chief Judge of Lagos State, Justice Kazeem Alogba, opened the new Legal Year with a Thanksgiving Service at the Cathedral Church of Christ, Marina and at the Eko Central Mosque, Lagos Island.
The Lagos governor said his administration has “given commitment to [Justice Alogba] to finish the [Commercial court aka] Tapa court, the GIC, and the Taylor magistrate court.”
“All that the Lagos magistracy has asked for privately, we will do publicly and more,” Sanwo-Olu said.
Alogba addressed moral decadence in society and said a greater burden of salvaging the deteriorating moral values in the Nigerian community lies with the kind of guidance parents provide.
At the Mosque, an Islamic cleric, Abdulgafar Mofesaye, enjoined judges and lawyers to do it all takes to avoid corruption and be steadfast in their dispensation of justice.
Mofesaye said judges and lawyers have a moral obligation to uphold justice and fairness.
He warned that corruption not only undermines the integrity of the legal profession but erodes the very foundations of a just society.
Likewise, the Diocesan Bishop of Lagos, Rt. Rev Ifedola Okupevi charged the judges to be fair in their judgment.
Okupevi referenced Exodus 23: 1-9, a passage that Justice Olutoyin Ipaye, the Administrative Judge of Lagos state High Court had read earlier in the service.
Okupevi urged the judges with the scriptures, “Do not follow the crowd in doing wrong. Do not deny justice to your poor people in their lawsuits.
“Have nothing to do with a false charge and do not put an innocent or honest person to death, for I [God] will not acquit the guilty.
“Do not accept a bribe, for a bribe blinds those who see and twist the words of the innocent.”
Okupevi charged the justices to continue in their effort and curtail the onslaught of rape, divorce and violence in Lagos state
A community leader, Bashorun Alabi-Macfoy, urged the Judiciary to intensify its efforts in the fight against sexual and drug abuse in the society.
In the company of the Judges of the Lagos state High Court, Magistrates, Senior Advocates of Nigeria and members of the Nigerian Bar and council of Lagos White-cap chiefs, Alogba inspected a police parade to close the ceremony of Legal year opening.
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