ABUJA—THE National Judicial Council, NJC, has proposed N5.2 billion in the 2017 budget for the settlement of gratuity and pensions for retired federal judicial officers. It is against the N1.4 billion budgeted between 2014 and 2016. This was discovered yesterday during the 2016 budget appraisal and 2017 budget defence for the Supreme Court, Court of Appeal, Federal High Court, National Judicial Institute, Body of Benchers and National Judicial Council at the Aminu Shagari-led House of Representatives Committee on Federal Judiciary. A breakdown of the proposed N5.2 billion showed that N134.4 million was proposed to be paid monthly for a period of one year, totalling about N1.6 billion. On special courts Shagari said: ‘’It also caters for the gratuities, pensions and retirement of about 400 retired judicial officers nationwide. With the introduction of democracy and the growth of the Nigerian economy, there had been demands for the establishment of more courts or special courts due to the meteoric increase in the number of cases handled by the existing courts both at the federal and state levels.”
