Supreme Court to appoint 8 justices, 1 region absent from allocated slots

The Supreme Court is set to appoint eight judges to fill the court’s bench to its full complement of 21 justices.

The apex court currently has 13 judges and has been finding it difficult to get along amid a mounting workload from all kinds of appeals.

According to Premium Times, only the northeast geo-political zone is said not to have a vacant slot.

The Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Olukayode Ariwoola, is said to have sent notices for the nomination of candidates to fill available slots on the court’s bench.

The nominations are expected to be processed into a shortlist that will be sent to the National Judicial Council (NJC) which is also chaired by the CJN.

The NJC will then assess and interview the candidates, and send the list of successful ones to President Bola Tinubu for appointment which is subject to confirmation of the Senate.

It was gathered that the Nigerian Bar Association (NBA), heads of courts, and judges of the Supreme Court have received the CJN’s requests for nominations in the preliminary stage of the appointment process.

NBA president, Yakubu Maikyau, in an email addressed to lawyers on Friday, June 16, urged interested and suitably qualified lawyers from the regions to submit their expression of interest to the NBA secretariat in Abuja on or before 21 June.

Among the six geo-political zones in the country, only the northeast is said not to have a vacant slot currently. According to the report, the South-east has two slots; South-south has one; South-west has two; North-central has two and North-west has one.

The Supreme Court appointments are done to ensure regional spread and this applies to the Court of Appeal and other federal courts. However, from time to time, there is disparity in the number of representatives of the six regions due to retirements, disciplinary actions, and deaths which do not follow any particular order.

In the current Supreme Court bench, the South-east and the North-central regions, with one slot each, are the least represented. The South-west has three slots, South-south two; the North-west and the North-east have three each.

After this latest appointment, South-west will have five slots on the Supreme Court bench, South-south, four, and South-east three.

The North-west will also occupy five slots and North-central, three. The North-east will remain three as the region is not expected to have any addition from the ongoing appointment process.