"THE IDEA OF LAW"
Yemi Candide-Johnson

Persistent acrimonious controversies, confusion, conflict and bickering over legal and constitutional powers or responsibilities in our government and failure to project a coherent scheme for law making and for delivery of justice are blamed on the youth of our democracy or the obvious immaturity and inexperience of political actors. In fact these are sad symptoms of a deeper problem. That is, widespread lack of respect for law and order, and a fundamental failure in key government institutions including the judiciary to understand the very idea of law. Perhaps it is 30 years of military misrule that taught us to exalt expediency, force and trickery over the logic and order of a settled system, but we cannot rebuild an ordered and progressive society unless we recognize and protect the sanctity of fundamental principles of law and government.

The purpose of law is to arrange competing rights and needs in order and to found a system to which civil society will adhere voluntarily. The underlying principles must be clear and simple, and must be clearly understood to apply to a wide variety of complicated circumstances, which will surely test the law. Systems do work in the long run and it is by time honoring a settled system that the attitude of respect, which will perpetuate the system, will develop. It is the responsibility of government to administer society in order and under law. It is the duty of courts to discern, espouse these principles, and to apply them faithfully to the interpretation of laws and the settlement of disputes. This is what BRACTON expressed in the 13th Century, “Laws and Customs of England” - “If however similar things happen to take place, they should be adjudged in a similar way: for it is good to proceed from precedent to precedent”.  In the 16th Century, Coke could declare that “there is no jewel in the world comparable to learning, no learning so excellent for both Prince and subject, as knowledge of laws; and no knowledge of any laws, (I speak of human) so necessary for all estates and for all causes, concerning goods, lands or life, as the common laws of England”. For hundreds of years, the English common law (which we inherited) has reflected accumulated and expressed learning upon these fundamental principles, which the Judges have enshrined by their decisions, and which executive, legislature and civil society at large respect and therefore obey. And it has worked.

In Nigeria, we appear to have laws, incoherent in themselves and in the context of a common law and the constitution, and lacking anchor on any fundamental principle. This means that they can be crafted and then interpreted in a haphazard way, which is open to manipulation and corruption. It means that neither the people nor the Judges themselves have regard for precedent, learning, principles or the authority of law. It means that we affect the grandiosity of English law in our legal dress, our language and in the atmosphere of law making and dispute resolution, but we deny the process its integrity, spiritual power and its authority. It means that it is nearly impossible to predict the outcome of a dispute and so it is always worthwhile to rush to court on the most cynical of claims. It means that our Supreme Court must be burdened with appeals on trifling legal, procedural issues, which fight for space with the greatest issues of our time. It means that no Nigerian common law can be espoused and our law remains primitive and primordial and that there is no light at the end of the tunnel. It means that it may be better to shed blood, because crime can pay, and because expediency and power and trickery can prevail.

It is a great testimony to the life of the late and much lamented Chief Bola Ige S.A.N. that he initiated and championed a far-reaching action plan for reform of our system of justice. Maybe the next Attorney General will catch this vision. Then Justinian will have succeeded Cicero.

Yemi Candide-Johnson
24th January 2002