Legal Aid Council Partners Federal Civil Service On Improve Governance, Effective Service Delivery
By Emma Onuwa
The Legal Aids Council of Nigeria under the leadership the Director General Aliyu Bagudu Abubakar has held a one-day workshop with the theme “Improved governance and effective service delivery” for all Civil Servants in Abuja and its environs.
NaijaBlitzNews reports that the Director-General while declaring the workshop open said the workshop was in line with the Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation Plan 2021 – 2025.
He further emphasised that the programme was relevant to the present administration of Legal Aids Council of Nigeria to prioritize the training of Civil Servants to meet global best practices.
According to the DG, ” I appealed to all staff to pay attention to every issue that would be discussed by the resource persons who are experts in the field”
“This was very important because the public service is changing and it will no longer be business as usual, so to be forewarned is to be forearmed. “As your DG, I, alongside other agencies under the Ministry of Justice, have signed a performance bond from the Presidency with the Federal Ministry of Justice under the watch of the Honourable Attorney-General of the Federation and Minister of Justice Lateef Fagbemi SAN.”
“It will interest you to know that, the present administration has an 8-Point Agenda which is known as Renewed Hope Agenda, one of them being the Rule of Law and this is where Legal Aid Council falls under.”
The Director General further informed the participants that LACoN is already running with the vision and also revisiting the Legal Aid Act of 2011 to capture the areas the Council has not delved into, for instance section 19 of the Act empowers periodic inspection of prisons where Nigerians are detained likewise Police cells, DSS, NDLEA and other detention outfits across the country. Due to lack of funds, LACoN limits visits to Prisons and Police cells.
He equally called on lawyers handling pro- bono cases to be registered with the LACoN because such data needs form part of the returns to the Federal Ministry of Justice, adding that identifying with LACoN will also qualify them for a Certificate of Compliance which will be given to them after handling cases to completion, which is mandatory when applying for the rank of Senior Advocate of Nigeria.
Abubakar also spoke briefly on the Vision and Mission of the Council and the 3 main areas of service rendered by LACoN, namely Civil, Criminal, and Community Legal Services and encouraged lawyers to visit the nearest police stations to their houses within the week to render services to persons detained in such facilities in the interest of pro-bono.
Resource persons from the Federal Ministry of Justice and the Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation represented by Mrs Victoria Ojogbani who is the Director of Planning, Research and Statistic also impacted the lives of the staff while delivering her lecture on the role of LACoN in ensuring performance and relevance in the 8-Point Agenda of present administration.
The Director, Human Resource Management with the Federal Ministry of Justice Mrs Mabel Erastus also gave an overview of Federal Civil Service Strategy and Implementation plan.
Others who gave lectures are Mr. Osagie, an Assistant Director Administration who gave a lecture on the IPPIS-Human Resource Module in Public Service. Mrs Salawu of the Office of the Head of Civil Service of the Federation on the overview of the New Performance Management System and Mr S. Banjo, Director Planning Research and Statistics LACoN who took staff through the LACoN performance template.
END.