Prescriptive strategies to combat corruption within the administration of justice sector in Nigeria

Nigeria with an estimated 160 million people is Africa’s most populous country, is oil-rich, but has been hobbled since its independence by political instability, corruption, inadequate infrastructure, and poor macroeconomic management. A new republic has just begun in the country in 2015 with the election of two anti-corruption crusaders as President and Vice president respectively. Although very few empirical studies exist on the subject of corruption within the justice system in Nigeria the intolerable popular impression is that the machinery of justice in Nigeria is quite notoriously corrupt.

Previous studies focusing specifically on judicial corruption in Africa have placed Nigeria within a middle-ranking position, whereupon it is seen as better than Kenya and the United Republic of Tanzania, but worse than Botswana, Ghana and Senegal. The aim of this paper is to identify strategies and mechanisms that will enhance the professionalism, effectiveness, integrity, accountability and transparency of the organisations within Nigeria’s administration of justice system Judiciary both at the federal and state levels including: Ministries of Justice, the Police, the Prison Service, immigration, customs and even the Bar among others.