National Coordinator of Legal Defense Assistance Project
(LEDAP)
The decision of the Supreme Court of Nigeria in the case of Ude
Jones Udeogu v Federal Republic of Nigeria & 2 Others (SC622c/2019,
delivered on May 8, 2020), known in the media as the Orji Uzor Kalu
case, has set Nigeria’s criminal jurisprudence backward in a manner
that is completely unjustifiable.
The crux of the judgment is that section 396(7) of the
Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015, (ACJA) which allowed a
High Court judge who is newly elevated to the Court of Appeal to
return and conclude his part-heard criminal matters at the High
Court while also performing his functions as a justice of the Court
of Appeal, is unconstitutional because it conflicts with the
provisions of the 1999 Constitution on the composition of the High
Court.
The Supreme Court held that a justice of the Court of Appeal is
not a judge of the High Court, and therefore cannot sit as such
judge, and that a statute such as ACJA cannot confer on him powers
that is absent in the constitutional provision.
The innovative provision of section 396(7) of ACJA was
introduced to reduce incidents of part-heard criminal cases
starting afresh because of judge handling the case is appointed to
a higher court. This practice of starting cases de novo usually
lead to failure of prosecutions because the witnesses will nearly
always be reluctant to return to court for another round of tedious
trials.
The Supreme Court found in this case that section 396(7) of ACJA
contravenes section 290 of the Constitution because it tries to
give powers of a High Court judge to a justice of the Court of
Appeal, which is not given by the Constitution. Being the
grundnorm, any law contrary to the constitutional provision is null
and void.
We respectfully hold the view that the decision is, procedurally
and substantively, unjustified. It is procedurally flawed because
it was the appellants in the case (as defendants at the trial
court) who requested for the newly elevated trial judge to return
to complete the trials. A person cannot benefit from his own
actions, if later found to be unlawful.
The decision is also substantively flawed because a statute can
give additional powers to a judge or justice, or to the court, and
that would not be considered as unlawful or conflicting with the
Constitution. It will conflict with the Constitution if such
statutory provision removes, limits or diminishes the
constitutional provisions.
There are other provisions of many statutes that permit the
justices of the appeal court to exercise the powers of the trial
court, such as sections 16 and 22 of the Court of Appeal Act and
Supreme Court Act respectively. Also, laws establishing
administrative inquiries or panels, permit a judge to sit as chair
or member of such administrative panel, without diminishing his
powers as a judge of the High Court or justice of the appeal court
when he returns to that position or concurrently performs same.
Thus, section 396(7) of ACJA simply added a function to the newly
appointed justice of the Court of Appeal but has not diminished his
role, position or function as a justice of the Court of Appeal.
Secondly, on substantive flaw of the decision, is that, it is
statute that determines the judicial function of the judicial
officer, and on this particular purpose of completing part-heard
criminal matters, the statute (ACJA) has, for that purpose only,
created a judicial function for the newly elevated justice of the
Court of Appeal, which does not limit or stop him from also sitting
as justice of the Court of Appeal. For that purpose and period, he
is a judge of the High Court.
A provision of a statute that is in conflict the provision of
the Constitution is voided because the (statutory) provision, if
put into effect, will defeat the constitutional provision or limit
its application or efficacy. A statutory provision cannot be
considered as conflicting with the constitution if it does not
interfere or limit or obstruct the provisions of the Constitution.
We most respectfully think that section 396(7) of ACJA did not
interfere with section 290 of the Constitution to limit or diminish
its purport.
Facts of the case
On 31 October, 2016, the former Governor of Abia State (now a
Senator), Orji Uzor Kalu, his company Slok Nigeria Ltd, and Mr.
Jones Udeogu, were charged at the Federal High Court Lagos with 7
count charges of corruption. The trial commenced before Justice
M.B. Idris and the prosecution called 19 witnesses and closed its
case. The defendants filed a no case submission, and before this
was heard and determined, Justice Idris was on 20 June 2018
appointed as justice of the Court of Appeal, and was sworn-in on 22
June 2018. Upon the letter of request by the counsel to one of the
defendants, the President of the Court of Appeal, acting under the
provisions of section 396(7) of ACJA, issued permission for Justice
Idris to return to the High Court and complete the case.
If the case were to be re-assigned to another judge of the High
Court, it would have to start afresh, and the prosecution will have
to recall all the witnesses. This is a herculean task which this
new provision of ACJA sought to prevent.
Now, Justice Idris returned and completed the case, and the
defendants were convicted. The former Governor was sentenced to 12
years in prison and Mr. Udeogu to 14 years.
Meanwhile, when Justice Idris heard the no case submission made
by the defendants, he overruled it and held that they had a case to
answer, whereupon they appealed to the Court of Appeal, where they
raised the issue that Justice Idris could not continue to hear the
case after his elevation. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal
and held that the provision of section 396(7) of ACJA in this
respect was in order. It was this decision of the Court of Appeal
that was appealed to the Supreme Court.
While the appeals were pending, the trial continued at the High
Court. Of course, in pre-ACJA dispensation, the trial would have
stopped to await the decision of the appeal courts, an infamous
enterprise that had stalled hundreds of cases of politically
exposed persons, and had considerably stultified Nigeria’s fight
against corruption. This is because under section 306 of ACJA, a
trial cannot be stayed or suspended because of an appeal against
any interlocutory decision of the court.
Some state-level versions of ACJA has gone further to provide
that no interlocutory appeal can be filed, and that any complain
against any decision of the court should be brought as one appeal
at the end of the case. Section 306, as well as section 396(7) of
ACJA now struck down by the Supreme Court, are among the 54 or so
innovations in ACJA, which are highly acclaimed to have
kick-started modernizing and improving our criminal justice
administration.
Section 396 (7) of ACJA provides thus:
“Notwithstanding the provision of any other law to the contrary, a
judge of the High Court who has been elevated to the Court of
Appeal shall have dispensation to continue to sit as a High Court
Judge only for the purpose of concluding any part heard criminal
matte pending before him at the time of his elevation and shall
conclude the same within a reasonable time: Provided that this
subsection shall not prevent him from assuming duty as a justice of
the Court of Appeal.”
Decision of the Supreme Court
The Court of Appeal had held that, ordinarily, where a judge is
elevated to the Court of Appeal, he ceased to exercise the function
of his former judicial position, and any action or decision he made
would be void. This has been Nigeria’s adjudicatory jurisprudence
for long, as exemplified in such cases as Ogbunyinye v Okudo (1979)
NSCC 77, and Our Line Ltd v S.C.C. Nigeria Ltd & Ors (2009) 17 NWLR
(Pt. 1170) 383; Iyela v C.O.P (1969) 1 NMLR 180, among many other
cases.
However, the Court of Appeal found that where a statutory
provision gives a special dispensation to an elevated justice, then
it is a lawful exception to the rule. It was this decision that the
Supreme Court overturned and declared section 396(7) of ACJA that
made such dispensation as unconstitutional. Hon. Justice Ejemba
Eko, who read the leading judgment of the Supreme Court, stated
that the section conflicts with:
‘… the powers or the jurisdiction of the Federal High Court as
duly constituted under Section 253 of the Constitution. That is,
that “the Federal High Court shall be duly constituted if it
consists of at least one Judge of that Court”. I should think that
the special dispensation granted to the “Judge of the High Court
elevated to the Court of Appeal – to continue to sit as a High
Court Judge only for the purpose of concluding any part-heard
criminal matter pending before him at the time of his elevation”
cannot be accommodated under or by Section 252 of the Constitution.
I must point out, right away, that by the tenor of Section 253 of
the Constitution, the Federal High Court is not duly constituted by
Judge(s) who had ceased to be judge(s) of that Court by the fact of
his elevation to the Court of Appeal or otherwise.’
His Lordship Ejemba Eko JSC then concluded emphatically
that:
“Ab initio, section 396(7) of the ACJA 2015 was set out to
frontally contradict and challenge the letters, substance and
spirit of section 290 (1) of the 1999 Constitution. To that extent,
section 396(7) of the ACJA 2015 is inconsistent with the
Constitution, particularly section 290 (1) thereof. Therefore, by
operation of section 1(3) of the Constitution, section 396(7) of
the ACJA 2015 to the extent of its inconsistency with section 290
(1) of the Constitution, is void.”
All the six other justices that sat at the Full Panel of the
court agreed with the judgment, a procedural situation that will
make a judicial revisit of the decision an uphill task.
The process through which the President of the Court of Appeal
issued the permission for Justice Idris’s returning to complete the
hearing of the case was initiated by the appellants. For decades,
it is the law that the courts cannot be used as an instrument for a
person to take advantage of his own illegal act (as it now turned
out, as found by the Supreme Court, that the fiat/permission was
unlawful). Sodipo v Lemmimkainen (1986) 1 NWLR (Pt. 15) 220 per
Aniogulu JSC.
We do not think there is a constitutional breach for a statute
to confer on an appellate court the powers of a trial court, or for
a statute to confer on a judicial officer of a particular court the
powers or functions of judicial officer of another court. It is the
law of this land that judges of the High Court or justices of
appellate courts are regularly appointed as judges of tribunals or
chairs or members of administrative panels of inquiry. It has not
been argued, as was successfully submitted in this case, that
because the person who has the constitutional function to appoint
such a judge or justice has only appointed him as such judge of the
High Court or justice of the Court of Appeal, and therefore he
cannot assume any other function on appointment by another person
because that will conflict with the constitutional powers to
appoint. In other words, as was stated in the Supreme Court’s
judgment, it is the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria
that has the constitutional duty to appoint a judge of the High
Court, and so, the president of the Court of Appeal could not by
her fiat, appoint a justice of the Court of Appeal as a judge of
the High Court.
If this argument is stretched, then a justice of the Supreme
Court or of the Court of Appeal or a judge of the High Court,
cannot be appointed into another function, including the election
tribunals or administrative panels of inquiry because there are
different persons what are constitutional or statutorily authorized
to appoint a judge or justice, and members of election tribunals or
administrative panels of inquiry. It is the function of the
enabling statute and Practice Directions issued under the statute
that panels of election tribunals are appointed from among judges
and justices, who are already appointed by the President of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria on recommendation of National Judicial
Council, and sworn in accordance with the Constitution. It is not
the same President, on recommendation of the National Judicial
Council that appoint such judges or justices to election tribunals
or administrative panels of inquiry.
The point we are making, most respectfully, is that, once the
statute confers a judicial function on a person, and in this case,
section 396(7) of ACJA to a newly appointed justice of the Court of
Appeal for a function that will be performed at the High Court,
that judicial officer is for that purpose statutorily authorized to
perform the function of the High Court judge. There is nothing in
conflict with his position, role and function as the justice of the
Court of Appeal.
The same situation is seen in section 16 of the Court of Appeal
Act, in which the Court of Appeal is given the powers of the trial
court, and thus can exercise all the powers of that court upon
hearing an appeal. The Court of Appeal can, under the section,
review the evidence, evaluate them and make any orders which the
High Court ought to have made. That statutory function has not
diminished the constitutional position or status of the justice of
that appellate court. See also section 22 of Supreme Court Act that
gives similar powers to the justices of the Supreme Court.
To this extent, we see no conflict in the provisions of section
396(7) of ACJA with sections 290 of the 1999 Constitution or any
provision of the Constitution. However, as the Supreme Court has
ruled, that section is unconstitutional and now struck down. The
implication is that several cases that had been concluded by newly
elevated justices of the Court of Appeal will have to be reviewed
and upturned.
The upheaval implications of this decision to our criminal
jurisprudence is profound, and its negative impact will set us back
in the task of advancing the much needed purpose of ACJA, which is
fair, speedy and effective criminal justice administration in
Nigeria.
We proposed any of the two legislative ways forward, that
is:
(1) To insert similar provision as in section 369(7) of ACJA in
the Constitution as a proviso to section 290;
(2) To include in the Constitution, which is at the moment under
review by the National Assembly, a provision that a judicial
officer elevated to a higher court or to another function, should
concluded all part-heard matters before taking his oath of office
to the new office. Thus, the current case law that upon mere
announcement of the elevation of a judge or magistrate, he can no
longer perform the function of his former office, will be
legislatively overruled.
It is eagerly hoped among the pro-ACJA community that another
opportunity will soon arise in which the Supreme Court will have to
revisit Udeogu v FRN, and hopefully, overrule itself. As a policy
court, the Supreme Court has always strived to uphold
jurisprudential guidance that will enhance, rather than limit,
public interest and the rule of law.
Chino Edmund Obiagwu,
Obiagwu@ledapnigeria.org
National Coordinator of Legal Defense Assistance Project
(LEDAP)
The decision of the Supreme Court of Nigeria in the case of Ude
Jones Udeogu v Federal Republic of Nigeria & 2 Others (SC622c/2019,
delivered on May 8, 2020), known in the media as the Orji Uzor Kalu
case, has set Nigeria’s criminal jurisprudence backward in a manner
that is completely unjustifiable.
The crux of the judgment is that section 396(7) of the
Administration of Criminal Justice Act 2015, (ACJA) which allowed a
High Court judge who is newly elevated to the Court of Appeal to
return and conclude his part-heard criminal matters at the High
Court while also performing his functions as a justice of the Court
of Appeal, is unconstitutional because it conflicts with the
provisions of the 1999 Constitution on the composition of the High
Court.
The Supreme Court held that a justice of the Court of Appeal is
not a judge of the High Court, and therefore cannot sit as such
judge, and that a statute such as ACJA cannot confer on him powers
that is absent in the constitutional provision.
The innovative provision of section 396(7) of ACJA was
introduced to reduce incidents of part-heard criminal cases
starting afresh because of judge handling the case is appointed to
a higher court. This practice of starting cases de novo usually
lead to failure of prosecutions because the witnesses will nearly
always be reluctant to return to court for another round of tedious
trials.
The Supreme Court found in this case that section 396(7) of ACJA
contravenes section 290 of the Constitution because it tries to
give powers of a High Court judge to a justice of the Court of
Appeal, which is not given by the Constitution. Being the
grundnorm, any law contrary to the constitutional provision is null
and void.
We respectfully hold the view that the decision is, procedurally
and substantively, unjustified. It is procedurally flawed because
it was the appellants in the case (as defendants at the trial
court) who requested for the newly elevated trial judge to return
to complete the trials. A person cannot benefit from his own
actions, if later found to be unlawful.
The decision is also substantively flawed because a statute can
give additional powers to a judge or justice, or to the court, and
that would not be considered as unlawful or conflicting with the
Constitution. It will conflict with the Constitution if such
statutory provision removes, limits or diminishes the
constitutional provisions.
There are other provisions of many statutes that permit the
justices of the appeal court to exercise the powers of the trial
court, such as sections 16 and 22 of the Court of Appeal Act and
Supreme Court Act respectively. Also, laws establishing
administrative inquiries or panels, permit a judge to sit as chair
or member of such administrative panel, without diminishing his
powers as a judge of the High Court or justice of the appeal court
when he returns to that position or concurrently performs same.
Thus, section 396(7) of ACJA simply added a function to the newly
appointed justice of the Court of Appeal but has not diminished his
role, position or function as a justice of the Court of Appeal.
Secondly, on substantive flaw of the decision, is that, it is
statute that determines the judicial function of the judicial
officer, and on this particular purpose of completing part-heard
criminal matters, the statute (ACJA) has, for that purpose only,
created a judicial function for the newly elevated justice of the
Court of Appeal, which does not limit or stop him from also sitting
as justice of the Court of Appeal. For that purpose and period, he
is a judge of the High Court.
A provision of a statute that is in conflict the provision of
the Constitution is voided because the (statutory) provision, if
put into effect, will defeat the constitutional provision or limit
its application or efficacy. A statutory provision cannot be
considered as conflicting with the constitution if it does not
interfere or limit or obstruct the provisions of the Constitution.
We most respectfully think that section 396(7) of ACJA did not
interfere with section 290 of the Constitution to limit or diminish
its purport.
Facts of the case
On 31 October, 2016, the former Governor of Abia State (now a
Senator), Orji Uzor Kalu, his company Slok Nigeria Ltd, and Mr.
Jones Udeogu, were charged at the Federal High Court Lagos with 7
count charges of corruption. The trial commenced before Justice
M.B. Idris and the prosecution called 19 witnesses and closed its
case. The defendants filed a no case submission, and before this
was heard and determined, Justice Idris was on 20 June 2018
appointed as justice of the Court of Appeal, and was sworn-in on 22
June 2018. Upon the letter of request by the counsel to one of the
defendants, the President of the Court of Appeal, acting under the
provisions of section 396(7) of ACJA, issued permission for Justice
Idris to return to the High Court and complete the case.
If the case were to be re-assigned to another judge of the High
Court, it would have to start afresh, and the prosecution will have
to recall all the witnesses. This is a herculean task which this
new provision of ACJA sought to prevent.
Now, Justice Idris returned and completed the case, and the
defendants were convicted. The former Governor was sentenced to 12
years in prison and Mr. Udeogu to 14 years.
Meanwhile, when Justice Idris heard the no case submission made
by the defendants, he overruled it and held that they had a case to
answer, whereupon they appealed to the Court of Appeal, where they
raised the issue that Justice Idris could not continue to hear the
case after his elevation. The Court of Appeal dismissed the appeal
and held that the provision of section 396(7) of ACJA in this
respect was in order. It was this decision of the Court of Appeal
that was appealed to the Supreme Court.
While the appeals were pending, the trial continued at the High
Court. Of course, in pre-ACJA dispensation, the trial would have
stopped to await the decision of the appeal courts, an infamous
enterprise that had stalled hundreds of cases of politically
exposed persons, and had considerably stultified Nigeria’s fight
against corruption. This is because under section 306 of ACJA, a
trial cannot be stayed or suspended because of an appeal against
any interlocutory decision of the court.
Some state-level versions of ACJA has gone further to provide
that no interlocutory appeal can be filed, and that any complain
against any decision of the court should be brought as one appeal
at the end of the case. Section 306, as well as section 396(7) of
ACJA now struck down by the Supreme Court, are among the 54 or so
innovations in ACJA, which are highly acclaimed to have
kick-started modernizing and improving our criminal justice
administration.
Section 396 (7) of ACJA provides thus:
“Notwithstanding the provision of any other law to the contrary, a
judge of the High Court who has been elevated to the Court of
Appeal shall have dispensation to continue to sit as a High Court
Judge only for the purpose of concluding any part heard criminal
matte pending before him at the time of his elevation and shall
conclude the same within a reasonable time: Provided that this
subsection shall not prevent him from assuming duty as a justice of
the Court of Appeal.”
Decision of the Supreme Court
The Court of Appeal had held that, ordinarily, where a judge is
elevated to the Court of Appeal, he ceased to exercise the function
of his former judicial position, and any action or decision he made
would be void. This has been Nigeria’s adjudicatory jurisprudence
for long, as exemplified in such cases as Ogbunyinye v Okudo (1979)
NSCC 77, and Our Line Ltd v S.C.C. Nigeria Ltd & Ors (2009) 17 NWLR
(Pt. 1170) 383; Iyela v C.O.P (1969) 1 NMLR 180, among many other
cases.
However, the Court of Appeal found that where a statutory
provision gives a special dispensation to an elevated justice, then
it is a lawful exception to the rule. It was this decision that the
Supreme Court overturned and declared section 396(7) of ACJA that
made such dispensation as unconstitutional. Hon. Justice Ejemba
Eko, who read the leading judgment of the Supreme Court, stated
that the section conflicts with:
‘… the powers or the jurisdiction of the Federal High Court as
duly constituted under Section 253 of the Constitution. That is,
that “the Federal High Court shall be duly constituted if it
consists of at least one Judge of that Court”. I should think that
the special dispensation granted to the “Judge of the High Court
elevated to the Court of Appeal – to continue to sit as a High
Court Judge only for the purpose of concluding any part-heard
criminal matter pending before him at the time of his elevation”
cannot be accommodated under or by Section 252 of the Constitution.
I must point out, right away, that by the tenor of Section 253 of
the Constitution, the Federal High Court is not duly constituted by
Judge(s) who had ceased to be judge(s) of that Court by the fact of
his elevation to the Court of Appeal or otherwise.’
His Lordship Ejemba Eko JSC then concluded emphatically
that:
“Ab initio, section 396(7) of the ACJA 2015 was set out to
frontally contradict and challenge the letters, substance and
spirit of section 290 (1) of the 1999 Constitution. To that extent,
section 396(7) of the ACJA 2015 is inconsistent with the
Constitution, particularly section 290 (1) thereof. Therefore, by
operation of section 1(3) of the Constitution, section 396(7) of
the ACJA 2015 to the extent of its inconsistency with section 290
(1) of the Constitution, is void.”
All the six other justices that sat at the Full Panel of the
court agreed with the judgment, a procedural situation that will
make a judicial revisit of the decision an uphill task.
The process through which the President of the Court of Appeal
issued the permission for Justice Idris’s returning to complete the
hearing of the case was initiated by the appellants. For decades,
it is the law that the courts cannot be used as an instrument for a
person to take advantage of his own illegal act (as it now turned
out, as found by the Supreme Court, that the fiat/permission was
unlawful). Sodipo v Lemmimkainen (1986) 1 NWLR (Pt. 15) 220 per
Aniogulu JSC.
We do not think there is a constitutional breach for a statute
to confer on an appellate court the powers of a trial court, or for
a statute to confer on a judicial officer of a particular court the
powers or functions of judicial officer of another court. It is the
law of this land that judges of the High Court or justices of
appellate courts are regularly appointed as judges of tribunals or
chairs or members of administrative panels of inquiry. It has not
been argued, as was successfully submitted in this case, that
because the person who has the constitutional function to appoint
such a judge or justice has only appointed him as such judge of the
High Court or justice of the Court of Appeal, and therefore he
cannot assume any other function on appointment by another person
because that will conflict with the constitutional powers to
appoint. In other words, as was stated in the Supreme Court’s
judgment, it is the President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria
that has the constitutional duty to appoint a judge of the High
Court, and so, the president of the Court of Appeal could not by
her fiat, appoint a justice of the Court of Appeal as a judge of
the High Court.
If this argument is stretched, then a justice of the Supreme
Court or of the Court of Appeal or a judge of the High Court,
cannot be appointed into another function, including the election
tribunals or administrative panels of inquiry because there are
different persons what are constitutional or statutorily authorized
to appoint a judge or justice, and members of election tribunals or
administrative panels of inquiry. It is the function of the
enabling statute and Practice Directions issued under the statute
that panels of election tribunals are appointed from among judges
and justices, who are already appointed by the President of the
Federal Republic of Nigeria on recommendation of National Judicial
Council, and sworn in accordance with the Constitution. It is not
the same President, on recommendation of the National Judicial
Council that appoint such judges or justices to election tribunals
or administrative panels of inquiry.
The point we are making, most respectfully, is that, once the
statute confers a judicial function on a person, and in this case,
section 396(7) of ACJA to a newly appointed justice of the Court of
Appeal for a function that will be performed at the High Court,
that judicial officer is for that purpose statutorily authorized to
perform the function of the High Court judge. There is nothing in
conflict with his position, role and function as the justice of the
Court of Appeal.
The same situation is seen in section 16 of the Court of Appeal
Act, in which the Court of Appeal is given the powers of the trial
court, and thus can exercise all the powers of that court upon
hearing an appeal. The Court of Appeal can, under the section,
review the evidence, evaluate them and make any orders which the
High Court ought to have made. That statutory function has not
diminished the constitutional position or status of the justice of
that appellate court. See also section 22 of Supreme Court Act that
gives similar powers to the justices of the Supreme Court.
To this extent, we see no conflict in the provisions of section
396(7) of ACJA with sections 290 of the 1999 Constitution or any
provision of the Constitution. However, as the Supreme Court has
ruled, that section is unconstitutional and now struck down. The
implication is that several cases that had been concluded by newly
elevated justices of the Court of Appeal will have to be reviewed
and upturned.
The upheaval implications of this decision to our criminal
jurisprudence is profound, and its negative impact will set us back
in the task of advancing the much needed purpose of ACJA, which is
fair, speedy and effective criminal justice administration in
Nigeria.
We proposed any of the two legislative ways forward, that
is:
(1) To insert similar provision as in section 369(7) of ACJA in
the Constitution as a proviso to section 290;
(2) To include in the Constitution, which is at the moment under
review by the National Assembly, a provision that a judicial
officer elevated to a higher court or to another function, should
concluded all part-heard matters before taking his oath of office
to the new office. Thus, the current case law that upon mere
announcement of the elevation of a judge or magistrate, he can no
longer perform the function of his former office, will be
legislatively overruled.
It is eagerly hoped among the pro-ACJA community that another
opportunity will soon arise in which the Supreme Court will have to
revisit Udeogu v FRN, and hopefully, overrule itself. As a policy
court, the Supreme Court has always strived to uphold
jurisprudential guidance that will enhance, rather than limit,
public interest and the rule of law.
Chino Edmund Obiagwu,
Obiagwu@ledapnigeria.org