COURTS IN 15 STATES TO REMAIN SHUT - JUSUN

The Judiciary Staff Union of Nigeria (JUSUN) thursday  said courts in 15 states would remain shut until the affected states give a commitment  to guarantee the financial autonomy of the judiciary.

In a statement issued in Abuja Thursday, the President of the union, Mr. Marwan Adamu, said the states where the judiciary workers’ strike was in its fourth month were Ekiti, Kaduna, Yobe, Taraba, Adamawa, Nasarawa and Plateau.Others are Benue, Anambra, Abia, Enugu, Osun, Ondo, Edo and Cross River states

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The statement reads in part, “The Judiciary Staff Union of Nigeria has said that it is committed to ensuring the full autonomy of the Judiciary sector in all the states of the Federation.

“The union wishes to state that the ongoing strike in 15 states will be sustained until proper things are done by the affected governors.”

Adamu also urged the public to disregard claim by those he described as “mischief-makers who are spreading rumors of fresh strike by the union”.

He said the strike would have been suspended if those state governors had done the needful “to save the sector from further ridicule by enemies of democracy”.

Adamu also said the union's lawyers had concluded plans to obtain a court order to  freeze the accounts of Benue and Plateau states “for their inability to pay JUSUN members for over five months”.

While congratulating the president-elect, Maj. Gen. Muhammadu Buhari, rtd.  on his victory at the poll, JUSUN also said it looked forward to working with him ”to ensure the independent and freedom of judiciary in Nigeria."

The union was pressing for the implementation of the January 13, 2014 judgment of a Federal High Court in Abuja which abolished piecemeal funding of the judiciary by state governments and affirmed constitutional provisions on the financial autonomy of the justice sector.

To press home its demand, JUSUN embarked on a nationwide strike on January 5, 2015, but the industrial action was suspended in federal courts and some  states after their governments gave commitment to meet the union’s demand.