National President of the Judiciary Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN), Comrade Marwan Mustapha Adamu, said that all courts in the country will continue to remain shut until governments at all levels see the need to ensure a free, vibrant and independent judiciary in the country.
The union had embarked on an indefinite strike from Friday January 2, 2015 due to what they described as “insensitive” and the failure of stakeholders to respect the last memorandum of understanding regarding financial autonomy of the judiciary. It said as such, the union would commence an indefinite strike from January 2, 2015 pending when the judiciary will be free from the captives and strangulation of the executive governors in the states.
Comrade Marwan said JUSUN is convinced that this is the time to rescue the judiciary from the strangulation of the state governors who don’t want a free and independent justice system in Nigeria.
The union, after an emergency meeting of the National Executive Committee (NEC), before the Christmas and New Year holidays in Abuja, said the action became imperative, considering what is described as the “Rough terrain encountered by the union to make the governors implement the judgment of Federal High Court delivered on 13th January, 2014 which but fell on deaf ears”.
Marwan said the union’s action is a reaction to a level of “insincerity and insensitive” of the governors and the insecurity in the process of democratic principles as they have conspired to disallow a constitutionally guaranteed and provided partners to exercise their due rights.
It would be recalled that the previously intended strike was suspended following the last memorandum of understanding supervised by the Ministry of Labour. The recent memorandum of understanding dated November 27, 2014 is breached during the last Federation Account Allocations Committee (FAAC) meeting in December 2014. 