The President, Major General Muhammadu Buhari (retd.), on Wednesday, denounced what he described as the “terribly slow pace” of justice administration in the Nigerian courts.

Buhari recalled how it took so long for the courts to decide and eventually dismiss the election petitions he filed to challenge his losses in the 2003, 2007, and 2011 presidential polls, declared that the Nigerian justice system needed an urgent reform.

He suggested that the judiciary should put a 12-month time limit on the hearing of criminal cases from the high court to the Supreme Court, while all civil cases should be concluded within 15 months.

Buhari spoke at the 60th Annual General Conference of the Nigerian Bar Association, with the theme, “Stepping Forward.”

His speech was read at the virtual conference by the Vice-President, Prof. Yemi Osinbajo.

Speaking about his experience, Buhari said: “At the end, I lost all three cases. I wondered then, why it needed to take so long to arrive at a verdict and if I had won the case, someone who did not legitimately win the election would have been in office all that time."

“In 2019, I was no longer a petitioner. I had now become a respondent in the case of Atiku and Buhari and the whole process took barely six months; just over six months. What was the difference? The law had changed since my own in 2003, 2007 and 2011.

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“You had now introduced time limits for election petitions. Everything must be done within a six to eight-month period.”

Buhari said since time limits have been put in place for electoral cases, criminal and civil matters should also be time-bound.

Continuing, he said: “My question then is why can’t we have a time limit for criminal cases? Why can’t we have a rule that will say a criminal trial all the way to the supreme court must not exceed 12 months? And why can’t we do the same for civil cases? Even if we say that civil cases must not go beyond between 12 and 15 months. I think that for me is stepping forward."

Commenting on the issue of judge’s appointments, the president recommended that aspiring judges should take tests.

He also criticized the spate of conflicting court orders by judges, saying at least eight conflicting court orders were made by different judges within six weeks during the recent leadership crisis that rocked the All Progressives Congress (APC).