11th August, 2014
By Eromosele Ebhomele
Members of the Lagos State House of Assembly, western Nigeria, on Monday, confirmed Governor Babatunde Fashola’s nominee for the position of Chief Judge of Lagos state.
Justice Olufunmilayo Olajumoke Atilade, who until the confirmation was the acting Chief Judge following the retirement of Justice Ayotunde Philips from the bench of the state judiciary, was approved for the position after screening by members of the House.
Justice Atilade, who turns 62 in September, has three years left on the bench and at the helm of affairs as the Chief Judge.
While being screened, she confirmed that she is related to retired Chief Justice Phillips, her sister.
She explained that at the time her sister was Chief Judge of the state, she was number six in hierarchy in the state, but that she divinely became the second to her sister upon her period of retirement.
Atilade said she became a magistrate at age 30 in 1982 and that she was elevated to the position of a judge in 1996.
She praised her sister for contributing immensely to the growth and development of the judicial arm of the state while promising to continue from there.
She also promised to complete the computerisation process of the judiciary started by the outgoing Chief Justice Phillips and make a case for appointment of more judges to speed up hearing of cases at the court.
She said: “we need about 100 judges to cope with the volume of work we have, right now we have about 50 judges and the work load is much for them, which means we need about 50 more judges.”
She further said she would continue with the decongestion of prisons started by her predecessor, especially with those awaiting trial which she attributed to delay in DPP report.
Speaker Adeyemi Ikuforiji urged the acting CJ to work on Section 270 of the 1999 Constitution as amended because the constitution provides that it is the House that should determine the number of judges for the state and not the governor of the state.