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Nigerian Law School campuses to go FG
By Ise-Oluwa Ige
Posted to the Web: Monday, April 03, 2006
ABUJA”THE Federal Government has concluded plans to scrap all the four law
school campuses in the country, Attorney-General of the Federation and
Minister of Justice, Chief Adebayo Ojo (SAN), has announced.
Chief Ojo told newsmen in Abuja that he would also effect a major shake-up
in all parastatals under his ministry. He said he would start with the
National Drug Law Enforcement Agency (NDLEA) which he said was now in shambles.
The four campuses to be shut are those in Lagos, Enugu, Kano and the
headquarters located in Bwari, a suburb of Abuja.
In their stead, individual universities offering law programmes would run
their own law schools and prepare their products and law graduates from other
universities for common bar examination conducted by the Council of Legal
Education.
He was, however, quick to add that the fact that a university runs law
programme does not automatically qualify it to run a law school, adding that a
university would only be allowed to run law school only if it has the
wherewithal.
According to the Justice Minister, the new arrangement will terminate the
recurring problem of backlog of law graduates awaiting admission into the
Nigerian Law School. Besides, he said the Federal Government had no business
establishing law school campuses in the country.
His words: The Nigerian Law School has been battling with the problem of
backlog of law graduates awaiting admission into the Nigerian Law School. We
have just solved that problem by introducing the current two-streams in the
school. But I want to find a permanent solution to it. I want to deregulate the
school. I want the Council of Legal Education to set standard, set
examinations for those who want to be lawyers in Nigeria.
We intend to scrap all the campuses and allow individual universities to
establish their own law schools but the Council of Legal Education will
accredit them and set standard for them. If you train your students
(universities),
you can come for the law school examination. Government has no business in
creating law campuses.
This is the next major project we are doing now. We have concluded plans. I
am using one law school abroad to do the fine-tuning.
Legal education in Nigeria will be brought to the 21st century standard.
The curriculum will be affected too. I don't have to amend the law to do
this.
Under the enabling law, I can do it, he said.
But the decision to scrap the four campuses of the Nigerian Law School has
begun to generate controversy in the legal circle. Many lawyers including
members of the inner bar like Prince Adetokunboh Kayode (SAN) have hailed the
plan while some others including Chief Chris Uche (SAN) condemned it.
According to Uche (SAN), "with due respect, I believe it will amount to
gross abdication of governmental responsibility to concession practical legal
education being handled by the Law Schools to the same University law faculties
that have been found not only deficient in theoretical legal education, but
defaulting by consistently exceeding quota restriction which in the first
place led to the backlog of students waiting to attend the Law Schools. I
think
it will not be in the interest of legal education in this country to do that
just because government wants to evade responsibility for the provision of
necessary logistics for the expansion of facilities for the Law Schools.
"We are grappling with the problem of falling standards, and rather than
solve it, any attempt to delegate law school education to University faculties
will exacerbate the problem. To resort to private studentship which is the
implication of the proposal is to eliminate the character contents of legal
education."

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