The Chief Justice of Nigeria (CJN), Justice Olukayode Ariwoola has disclosed that the Supreme Court presently has the lowest number of Justices in its history.
Ariwoola stated that the apex court has only 10 Justices on its bench to tackle the heavy workload of pending cases.
He stated this on Friday at the retirement of Justice Musa Dattijo Mohammed, who today attained the mandatory retirement age of 70 years.
The CJN, however, assured that efforts are in top gear to elevate a sizeable number of Justices to the bench of the Court.
“With Justice Musa Dattijo leaving us today after the retirement of Hon. Justice Adamu Amina Augie a few weeks ago, we are now left with just 10 Justices on the Supreme Court Bench; being the lowest we have ever had in contemporary history of the Court.
“However, I can confidently assure all the litigant public that efforts are in top gear to get on board a sizeable number of Justices to boost our rank and complement the tremendous effort we have been investing in the business of the Court,” he said.
He subsequently paid glowing tributes to the retired judge for his contribution to the Nigerian judicial system.
He said, “My Lord Hon. Justice Musa Dattijo Muhammad in whose honour we assemble here today, is an epitome of jurisprudential finesse, an insuperable lion with an irrepressible voice in the temple of justice.
“We are here to identify with an accomplished jurisprudential iconoclast that has offered the best of his intellect to the advancement of the legal profession through his several years of unblemished and incontrovertible adjudications at different levels of Courts in Nigeria.”
