Lagos – The Lagos Multi-Door Courthouse (LMDC) was assigned a total of 730 cases for out-of-court settlement between January and November, the Director, Mrs Caroline Etuk, said on Tuesday.
Etuk made this known to the News Agency of Nigeria (NAN) in Lagos on the sidelines of the 2014 Lagos Settlement Week.
NAN reports that the Settlement Week was set aside by the state Chief Judge, Justice Olufunmilayo Atilade, and runs from Dec.1 to Dec. 5.
It is for the resolution of cases through arbitration and other Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) processes.
“730 cases were referred to the LMDC by the courts; of the 730 cases, 601 have been screened as suitable while 129 cases were screened as unsuitable,” she said.
Etuk said that a major challenge faced by the court was the issue of partial submission by parties to a dispute.
According to him, often the court is faced with one of the parties to a dispute not submitting to authority of the court by filing their documents for ADR.
“Of the 601 suitable cases, we have only received 324 submissions of documents from both parties to their matter and we still have 277 partial submissions.
“I will like the parties who are yet to submit to do so immediately, to enable lawyers and clients enjoy the benefits of the free services provided by the LMDC rather than having their cases in court for years,” she said.
Etuk said all types of cases, apart from criminal cases and land matters, could be filed before the LMDC.
“We have avoided land cases because of their protracted nature, and due to the fact that the settlement week is usually a time bound process,” the director said.
She said that the LMDC had taken steps to encourage mediation through sensitisation programmes.
“We try as much as we can within our budget to publicise the settlement week and from time to time, we organise training programmes for lawyers on mediation,” Etuk said.
The director said that 1060 cases were referred to it during 2013 Settlement Week, of which 972 cases found suitable for mediation.
She said that out of the 972 cases only 351 were actually heard and 201 fully settled. (NAN)
730 cases referred to LMDC for ADR settlement — Director
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