The tenure of the Lagos State Judicial Panel on Restitution for Victims of SARS Related Abuses and other matters has again been extended for another three months.
The Chairman of the panel, Justice Doris Okuwobi stated this while hearing petitions on Friday.
This means that the panel will now sit until October 19, a day before the October 20, 2020 shootings at the Lekki toll gate.
Recall that the Lagos State judicial panel was inaugurated by Governor Babajide Sanwo-Olu of Lagos State on October 27, 2020.
The panel was set up to last for a period of six-month in response to the government acceding to the five-for-five demands of the #EndSARS protesters with a mandate to look into abuses by security agencies and the now-disbanded SARS unit of the Nigeria police force and to make recommendations to the authorities for restitution to victims of abuses.
The initial six months sitting of the Lagos panel expired on April 27, 2021, and the panel was granted a three-month tenure extension which is supposed to expire on Monday, July 19 but as of June 29, the panel had sat for 97 days and only heard 126 petitions out of the 235 petitions it received.
Since the commencement of the hearing, 37 had been concluded while 109 petitions remained unheard necessitating the request for an extension of time.
At Friday’s sitting, the panel heard eleven petitions. It reserved its decision in six petitions after counsel in the matters adopted their final written addresses.
![Rev. Fr. Anthony Odiong, a US-based Nigerian Louisiana Catholic priest, was arrested in Florida on Tuesday for possessing child pornography, according to law authorities. The suspect is reportedly accused of many other cases of sexual assault. The Waco, Texas, Police Department announced in a Facebook post on Tuesday that officers detained Father Anthony Odiong in Ave Maria, Florida, with assistance from the United States Marshals Service. Waco police announced in March that they had received "credible information" about a sexual assault allegedly committed by Odiong in Texas in 2012. “During the subsequent investigation, a case of possession of child pornography was uncovered,” the police said. The priest was apprehended in Florida by the Caribbean Regional Fugitive Task Force. The Waco Police Department said that he will be extradited to Texas. Odiong had previously served in the Archdiocese of New Orleans before being removed as priest in December of last year due to controversy over homilies in which he claimed, among other things, that the Catholic Church was being taken over by "the gays." At the time, the priest was also accused of abusive behaviour; a Louisiana lady claimed in U.S. bankruptcy court that Odiong had committed both financial and sexual abuse against her. Prior to joining the New Orleans Archdiocese, Odiong served in at least two Texas parishes. On Tuesday, Waco police stated that during their sexual assault investigation, "the presence of other survivors was revealed." “Multiple women have come forward to tell similar experiences as the sexual assault survivor who reported the initial allegation,” the police department said. “Survivors’ experiences ranged from sexual assault and indecent assault, more commonly recognised as groping, and financial abuse, with some survivors experiencing every element of Anthony Odiong’s manipulation.” The police said they “believe there may be more survivors, and we wish to speak with anyone who [has] had similar encounters” with the priest. The Archdiocese of New Orleans issued a brief news release on Tuesday noting Odiong's arrest in Florida. The archdiocese “encourages anyone with any information to contact law enforcement,” the release said.](https://chronicle.ng/wp-content/uploads/2024/08/ezgif-6-4730550ede-450x300.jpg "Odiong: US-based Nigerian Catholic priest convicted over sexual assault")
